Kidnapping charge against lovers under section 367 of IPC is frivolous and hence be suitably amended to stop torture against lovebirds, said AMOFOI, the organisation that has been holding intercaste love marriages for over last many years.
Giving an instance, an AMOFOI release said on August 16, Swapna Manjari Garnayak, a +2 Science students of 18 years old, of Khandayat caste married her lover Santanu Sahoo ( 28) of OBC Chasa community in AMOFOI. However, soon after their marriage in AMOFOI office, the couple was taken to police station at Khandagiri as Swapna's father Tuku Garnayak filed a kidnapping case under Sec. 367. Because there was an FIR against Swapna Manjari’s husband Santanu Sahoo filed in Bikrampur Police Station, Angul district, the couple again was shifted to the police station at 2 am in the middle of the night.
The couple had to stay in the Bikrampur PS till 7 pm in the evening of August 17 for no valid reason. They had to suffer hardships in two police stations under the plea of “kidnapping” that is there in the IPC Section 367. "Had Swapna Manjari Garnayak been Priyanka Chopra, the police would have not dared to give her such hardships. The police have no authority to interfere with the life of lovers whether they are in live-in relationship or in marital relationship. This is the law as laid down by Justice Sanjay K Kaul of the Supreme Court on February 12," said AMOFOI.
"In the case of Swapna Manjari Garnayak, the FIR filed by her father ought to have been rejected then and there after knowing the fact that the young woman in question is an adult bonafide citizen of India. The role of the parents in the marriage of their grown-up daughters of 18+ age has been fully written off by Justice Dipak Misra way back on 8.03.2018 (International Women’s Day). So, Section 367 should be suitably amended so that young men and woman who are in love are never put into any torture and hardship that was suffered by AMOFOI couple," demanded Freethought Party of India (FPI) general secretary B Ramchandra CST Voltaire.