Man gets 6-mth jail for kidnapping minor wife from lawful

A court here has sentenced a man to six months in prison for kidnapping his 17-year-old wife from her lawful guardianship.
Additional Sessions Judge Shivani Jaiswal awarded the jail term to Abdul Navi last week for kidnapping the minor from her lawful guardians, District Government Counsel Chaman Prakash Sharma said today.
The court, however, acquitted Navi of the charge of kidnapping the girl to compel her to marry him, he added.
According to the prosecution, the accused had married the girl in 2015 with her consent.
On February 3, 2015, a complaint was lodged at the Bisrakh police station by Ram Ratan, the father of the girl, alleging that his daughter had gone missing under mysterious circumstances.

On April 7, 2015, the police altered the charges in the FIR to IPC sections 363 (punishment for kidnapping) and 366 (kidnapping, abducting or inducing woman to compel her marriage).

On May 27 this year, the police recovered the girl and subsequently, the charge sheet in the case was submitted.
The counsel of the accused told the court that the girl had gone with him of her own will but admitted that she was below 18 years of age at that time.
The girl told the court that her date of birth, as per her high school records, was June 23, 1997 and hence, she was 17 years of age on February 1, 2015, when she had gone with the accused, who was known to her.

She added that she had gone from her house to the Sarai Kale Khan inter-state bus terminus in Delhi of her own will and called the accused, asking him to come there.
The accused took her to Harola village at Noida from the bus terminus, the girl told the court and added that subsequently, the two got married and were living as husband and wife since then.
Observing that the consent of a minor was immaterial, the court held the accused guilty under section 361, IPC (kidnapping a minor from lawful guardianship) and sentenced him to six months in prison.