Demanding money for business is as good as demanding dowry: HC

The Gujarat High court today upheld the conviction of a man and his mother in a dowry death case, observing that demanding money for starting a business was as good as demanding dowry.
"Any demand of money, property or valuable security made from the bride or her parents or other relatives by husband would fall within the mischief of 'dowry'," said the division bench of Chief Justice Bhaskar Bhattacharya and Justice J B Pardiwala.
"Formerly dowry was defined as property given as the consideration for the marriage but the words 'as consideration for the marriage' have been omitted and substituted by the words 'in connection with the marriage now," the court said.

Demand for money or valuables after the marriage too constitutes a dowry, it said.
Jamanagar-based Kamlesh Tanna and his mother had challenged a 2001 order of a sessions court sentencing them to seven years' imprisonment in a dowry death case.
Kamlesh married Sandhya in 1997. After the marriage, she was asked to bring Rs two lakh from her parents so that he could start a business.
She was harassed and eventually committed suicide in 2001. The couple had had two children by then.