The Allahabad High Court has rejected a petition filed by an inter-faith live-in couple seeking police protection on the grounds that such relationships were predominantly ‘time pass’ and lacked stability and sincerity.
The Bench of Justice Rahul Chaturvedi and Justice Mohd Azhar Husain Idrisi, while noting that the Supreme Court had validated the live-in relationship in several cases, observed that it could not expect the couple, who were in the tender age of 20-22 years and had been together for just two months, to give a serious thought over their ‘temporary’ relationship.
The High Court said life was not a bed of roses. It examined every couple on the ground of hard and rough realities. This was more of an infatuation against the opposite sex without any sincerity. Such fragile relationships often resulted in time pass, it added.
The Bench passed the order, while dismissing a petition filed jointly by the couple – a Hindu woman and a Muslim man. The petitioners sought quashing of the first information report (FIR) registered against the Muslim man under Section 366 (kidnapping) of the Indian Penal Code by the woman’s aunt.
The couple further sought police protection on the grounds that they had chosen to continue their live-in relationship. The counsel representing the woman argued that she was above 20 years of age, had every right to decide her future and had chosen to be in a live-in relationship with the accused.
The counsel representing the respondents claimed that the woman’s partner was already facing an FIR registered under the Uttar Pradesh Gangster Act. It was argued that he was a ‘road-romeo’ and a vagabond, who has no future and in all certainty, would ruin the life of the woman.
After listening to arguments from both sides, the High Court refused to grant any protection to the petitioner during the stage of investigation.
The Bench, however, made it clear that its stance should neither be misinterpreted as a judgement or endorsement of the petitioners’ relationship, nor as a safeguard against any lawful actions taken in accordance with the law.
It said unless and until the couple decided to marry and give a name of their relationship or showed sincerity towards each other, the High Court would shun and avoid expressing any opinion in such a relationship.
The petitioners were represented by Advocates Shadab Ahmad and Sadaqat Ullah Khan, while Advocate Dhirendra Kumar Verma represented the State and Advocate Srawan Kumar Swarnkar appeared for the complainant.