Hon'ble Judges/Coram:
Dr. D.Y. Chandrachud and Indira Banerjee

JUDGMENT

Dr. D.Y. Chandrachud, J.

1. Leave granted.

2. By its judgment dated 7 February 2019, the High Court of Judicature at Bombay dismissed an application Under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure 1973¹. The Appellant sought the quashing of a First Information Report² registered against him on 17 May 2016 with the Panvel City Police Station for offences punishable Under Sections 376, 417, 504 and 506(2) of the Indian Penal Code³ and Sections 3(1)(u), (w) and 3(2)(vii) of The Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities Act, 1989 (as amended by the Amendment Act, 2015)⁴. The second Respondent is the complainant.

3. The allegations in the FIR are summarised thus:

(i) According to the complainant, she and the Appellant have known each other since 1998. She would speak to the Appellant on the phone and met him regularly as early as 2004. In 2008 the Appellant proposed marriage and assured her that their belonging to different castes would not be a hindrance. The Appellant allegedly promised to marry the complainant after the marriage of his elder sister. On 23 January 2009 the Appellant allegedly re-iterated his promise to marry her at the Patnadevi Temple in Chalisgaon;

(ii) The complainant completed her B.Sc. in Agriculture in 2002 and worked as a Junior Research Assistant. In 2007 she was selected as a Naib Tahsildar at Chalisgaon. In March 2009 she was appointed to the post of Assistant Sales Tax Commissioner at Mazgaon. The Appellant would, it is alleged, come to meet her and lived with her in November 2009. During his visit, the complainant alleges that she refused to engage in sexual intercourse with the Appellant, but "on the promise of marriage he forcibly established corporeal relationships";

(iii) The complainant alleges that throughout 2010, the Appellant visited her on multiple occasions and they engaged in sexual intercourse. When the Appellant was posted in Gadchiroli, the complainant visited the Appellant multiple times over the course of 2011. Each of these visits lasted four to five days during which the complainant resided with the Appellant and they engaged in sexual intercourse. During these visits the complainant enquired about marriage and the Appellant responded in the affirmative. In December 2011 the Appellant visited her and resided in her house for four days;

(iv) The Appellant's elder sister was married on 5 February 2012. On 23 December 2012 the Appellant visited her and forced her to engage in........