A husband has the responsibility of keeping his wife happy and also ensuring her safety both inside and outside the house, a Delhi court observed while sentencing a man to three years jail for subjecting his spouse to cruelty.
Additional Sessions Judge Parveen Singh awarded the jail term to a Delhi-based man for harassing his wife mentally and physically observing that he acted like a “predator” and inflicted cruelty on her on a daily basis.
The woman had succumbed to her burn injuries here in 2012 and her husband was arrested later on the basis of his mother-in-law’s allegations against him.
“A person, who marries a woman and brings her to his home, has a responsibility of not only keeping her happy but also to keep her safe from any danger inside and outside the house. The convict violated that faith. The act of the convict thus, becomes more serious as the person who had the responsibility of providing safety acted like a predator and inflicted cruelty on a daily basis. Not just physical cruelty, the convict also mentally tortured the woman,” court said, while awarding the jail term.
The court, however, acquitted the man on charges of abetment to suicide noting that the incident in which the woman received burn injuries was “more an accident, less a suicide”.
“I find that the evidence before the court is insufficient to reach at a conclusion that the woman had committed suicide. Thus, the accused cannot be convicted for abetting a suicide, which has not been proved before court,” the judge noted.
According to police, the woman had received burn injuries in May 2012 at her marital home and was brought to a hospital. She succumbed to her burns during medical care.
Her mother had alleged that her son-in-law used to endlessly beat and torture her daughter.
On the basis of her complaint, the man was arrested and later in December 2012, charges were framed against him under sections 498A (cruelty by husband or his relatives) and 306 (abetment of suicide) of IPC to which he pleaded not guilty and claimed trial. During trial, the man had denied all the allegations levelled against him.