Allahabad High Court refuses to quash FIR against husband accused of posting nude pictures of wife on Whatsapp

The Allahabad High Court recently refused to quash an FIR against a husband who had posted nude pictures of his own wife on WhatsApp. .A bench of Justices Pankaj Naqvi and Vivek Agarwal said that a cognizable offence was made out.The Court was hearing a petition by the husband which sought quashing of a First Information Report (FIR) filed for offences under Sections 270, 313, 323, 376D and 34 of the Indian Penal Code and Section 67 of the Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008..The plea further sought a direction to grant protection from arrest to the petitioner during the course of the investigation..The Court was told that the allegations were false and fabricated since the complainant was the petitioner's wife and was six years elder to him and this was her second marriage..It was added that by overlooking all these aspects, false and concocted grounds were taken to lodge FIR. .Advocate Jata Shankar Pandey, counsel for the petitioner, submitted that the FIR had been lodged with a view to extract undue financial gains from the petitioner..Additional Government Advocate Gambhir Singh submitted that merely because the petitioner was the husband of the informant, that could not constitute a valid ground to quash the FIR..Relying on the law laid down in State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal, the bench clarified that there could be no interference with the investigation or order staying arrest unless cognizable offence was not ex-facie discernible from the allegations contained in the FIR or there was any statutory restriction operating on the power of the Police to investigate a case..Furthermore, from the perusal of the FIR, prima facie it could not be said that no cognizable offence was made out, the Court said. .Consequently, no ground existed for quashing of the FIR or staying the arrest of the petitioner, the Court concluded dismissing the petition. .[Read order]