Kerala High Court: A Division Bench of K Vinod Chandra and C Vijayachandran, JJ. dismissed the petition and rejected the relief sought for, finding that the detenue stated not to be in any illegal detention.
The facts of the case are such that the petitioner is the husband of the alleged detenue seeking issuance of a writ of habeas corpus to cause the production of the alleged detenue, on the premise that she is under illegal detention of her father/fifth respondent as they got married in spite of belonging to different religions and possible objections from their respective families.
The Court noted that as per a statement of the alleged detenue taken by a Woman Civil Police Officer, without the presence of the parents or any other family members of the alleged detenue, the alleged detenue stated that the marriage was registered without the knowledge of their parents; that the detenue thought of accompanying the petitioner after one month, since her mother was alone in their house; that both the families, who came to know about the marriage, are not willing to accept them; that the parents of the petitioner would never permit them to live together; that the detenue is seriously apprehensive of her safety at the house of the petitioner and that she is not under any illegal detention of her parents.
It was further stated by the alleged detenue that she was not subjected to any torture, whatsoever. Even when the alleged detenue would express that she is desirous of living with the petitioner, she fears that she would be ill-treated by the parents of the petitioner.
The Court observed that the alleged detenue is ambivalent in her stand and she prevaricates as between her desire to be with the petitioner on the one hand, and her serious apprehension and fear of being ill-treated by the parents of the petitioner, on the other hand.
The Court having limited jurisdiction held “we are not in a position to pass any order enabling the alleged detenue to live along with the petitioner. When the detenue is categoric in her statement that she is not under any illegal detention of her parents, we find no ground to issue a writ of habeas corpus. We, therefore, dismiss this writ petition.” [Sharaffudhin v State of Kerala, WP (Crl) No. 425 of 2022, decided on 31-05-2022]
For Petitioners: Mr P.T. Sheejish, Parvathy S.Krishnan P.K. Purush Harikiran, Praveenkumar P. Stephy Grace Raj Akhila Sridharan A.Abdul Rahman (A-1917)
For Respondent(s): Mr E.C. Bineesh