The Karnataka High Court has quashed a POCSO case registered against a Bengaluru husband, his parents and his sister after finding that the allegations concerning his three-and-a-half-year-old daughter were not supported by medical evidence or an independent statement from the child.
Justice M. Nagaprasanna, hearing the criminal petition filed by the husband and his family members, held that allowing further investigation in the case would amount to an abuse of the judicial process. The court said the criminal case appeared to have been used to obstruct the father’s custody and visitation rights during a matrimonial dispute.
The case arose after the couple, who married on July 1, 2018, approached the Family Court in 2024 amid growing disagreements. The husband had sought custody and visitation rights after alleging that the mother was repeatedly preventing him from meeting their daughter. The High Court had earlier allowed him to spend time with the child at fixed times on specified days.
According to the report, the mother later noticed redness and a rash around the child’s genital area after the child complained of discomfort while passing stool. She took the child to Cloudnine Hospital in Malleshwaram and subsequently alleged that the child had been sexually assaulted by the father, grandparents and paternal aunt. Police registered an FIR under Sections 8 and 10 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012.
The High Court relied on certificates submitted by doctors P. Bindu and Anuradha Sadashivamurthy, who had examined the child under the court’s direction. The judgment recorded that there was no medical basis to establish sexual assault and that the child had not independently described any such incident. The court noted that the allegation had emerged only through the mother’s account, as reported by Prajavani.
The court also cautioned against turning criminal proceedings into a collective punishment for an entire family merely because one member is involved in a matrimonial dispute. It said allegations must disclose the essential elements of an offence and be supported by specific factual details and contextual material. A complaint, the court observed, need not provide an exhaustive account of an incident, but it must contain enough material to justify criminal proceedings.
The judgment expressed concern that children involved in custody and visitation disputes were increasingly being drawn into serious criminal allegations between parents. The court said the child, who should remain at the centre of parental care, had instead become the focus of an adversarial dispute, raising concerns about her emotional security and welfare.
The court also left open the option for the husband and his family to pursue appropriate legal action under Section 22 of the POCSO Act against the complainant. The ruling, however, dealt with the criminal proceedings before the court and does not by itself resolve the wider matrimonial or custody dispute. Further proceedings concerning custody and visitation will remain subject to the orders of the competent family court.
