Advise asap..pls

Dear Querist,

After having read the facts, I can opine you the following :-

They can implicate you in a 498A cruelty for dowry/406 Criminal Breach of Trust - with respect to entrustment of dowry articles which they would allege you have misappropriated and not giving back. These offences since are very heinous may cause you and your family a lot of trouble initially if not tackled properly. It's always good to do some pre-emptive steps like  inttimating the authorities concerned without letting inlaws know about it to safeguard yourself. 

To bring her back you can file an RCR petition but before that do the protection work.

Feel free to talk !

Regards,

Bharat

Advocate

Sir,

Thanks for the reply. Can you please explain about my first protection step which you advised "pre-emptive steps like  inttimating the authorities concerned without letting inlaws know about it to safeguard yourself."

To which authorities I need to inform and what is the procedure?

"They said the original stamp paper is with them and they can sell at any time.So somehow i fought and legally stopped selling it."

You have not explained how you fought legally. Very difficult to comment without knowing what method you adopted there.  Secondly, stridhan is meant for her to use anytime during married life for any purpose.  Whether she can spend streedhan for the benefit of her parents is debatable point, but as far as I know, she can use it whatever way she wants because she has all rights over it.  And if the locker is in her name she has every right to open it and take the items in the locker and as it is streedhan she has a right to spend it for her use.  May be for medical use or any other genuine purpose which serves her comfort.  You are holding the key and not giving her to open because there is no account with bank what items are kept in locker, and if  gold is taken out spent off, tomorrow they can claim and allege, it is taken by you and your parents having forced her to open the locker.

So it is not so simple to say (like a bank account where operations are known), that when a locker is operated what is withdrawn from it, whether it is withdrawn partly or fully and when the amount of streedhan reduces, there is no account where it is spent whether on husband or parents.  You carry fear that having given it off to parents tomorrow she will lodge a complaint that husband's family had forcibly taken it off from me.  So you are within your right to prevent her from taking locker key to ensure entire amount remains as it is so that when any 498A case comes up you can give off entire gold kept in locker as it is to prove yourself innocent.  But from her side, she has a case, because if her family is in financial problems, when daughter is suffering disease, they need money to provide medical facilities in accordance with their social and financial status.  And she has a right to use her streedhan to her own benefit and medical purposes. 

Very peculiar situation, but even if you keep gold at home, whenever she withdraws some gold for her personal purposes because it is her right, you have to ask her to sign a receipt in the capacity of a depositor withdrawing and you act as a trustee of her streedhan.  It almost reflects the banking/official transaction at home which none of us would like to indulge in because we feel odd and ashamed doing so in view of the fact that we are family members, our relationship should be based on mutual trust.  This is a clear case of law spoiling marital relationships nothing else.
 

"If the court decides that it is a false case or discharges the accused, then the party making accusations and filing the case is liable to pay damages to the tune of Rs.......................".  This may be a very good clause in pre-nuptial agreement which may act as a deterrant because it infuses fear in the minds of people filing cases if court decides against me I will have to pay so much of amount to him. 

Dear Chanrasekhar sir,

Site is saved for future selling as requested Sarpathivalar(pattra) office where the site is mapped under.

Locker is in wife name, but the bank knows key is with me. So they wont take duplicate key request. So no

operation allowed.So completely all r legally secured.

@Satyanarayanan.  It is not so simple.  The streedhan is in locker.  May be she had given you the right to operate the locker though it is in her name.  But being accountholder she is also eligible to operate the locker.  And she has a right to use the streedhan for her, say, genuine purposes like medical expenses.  You have not given her the key because of which, she could not use the streedhan to give proper medical facilities to her child because of which it expired.  That will be the allegation.

They will say, in order to enjoy the property relating to her streedhan, you have forcibly kept the key under your custody and not allowed her to operate it.  The point is not when you the marriage fails, you have returned the entire property relating to streedhan or not.  The point is during conjugal life, when dire need had arisen, you have allowed her to exercise her right over streedhan or not.  There lies charge against you.

Dear Mr. Satyanarayana,

It seems, your case make complicated by you only. As mentioned by you,  "On the marriage day her father has mentioned everything whatever they gave in note book and gave it to my father(we call it as seedhana note book both parties sign it) with all proofs like FD bond,site stamp papers(xerox copy)."  

You both parites have a documentary evidence that sthreedhan is with you. According to this,  If you act smart you would be in trouble.  Because your wife has full right to spend the sthreedhan in any manner for any purpose of her own.  As said by you, if they lodge any complaint unnecessary you have to face porblems (if the case/complaint is false also ) So, Please think positively and sort out the issue at the earliest to lead peaceful marital life. - sureshmgpl@gmail.com 

@ Author

I must say being a queriest you have good understanding of Law yet have one last mile hitch (confusion).


See any property or valuable given to a woman at the time of her marriage or during the marriage ceremony, any property conferred on her by way of a will, any gift given to her by her parents, siblings and in-laws are all part of the woman’s property (Stridhan). She is the rightful owner of all such property and her husband or his relatives have no right over such property. With a view to avoiding any likely future dispute regarding stridhan property, the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961 has provided that the presents made at the time of marriage should be entered in the list to be maintained in accordance with the rules made under the Act. The seedhana which is with parties and signed by parties is similar to Rule 6 of maintaining list of articles with witness as per Dowry Prohibition Act. This part both parties have well covered from the face of reading your query it appears.

Now, the Supreme Court in re. Prathibha Rani Vs Suraj Kumar (AIR 1985 SC 628) has observed that stridhan property of a married woman, even if it is placed in the custody of her husband or in-laws, they would be deemed to be trustees and therefore are bound to return the same when demanded by her. Here is the catch which in my opinion was not handled well by parties thus this query before us. We understand protector and provider over enthusiastic concept you exhibited in humane dealing to your matrimonial problem but sometimes some of the matters should be let it go too. Next time when they and or she asks for her stridhan politely ask her and her side to simply write in a piece of paper the same with date / signature and gladly return the same via a receiving list. Your trusteeship cometh to an end by this simple handing over / taking over of materials (articles) which in any way was not yours and or your families..

Also I do subscribe to ld. brother Bharat what he said above and elaborated here as a person who denies a woman her dowry-property or stridhan as explained above is guilty of the offence of criminal breach of trust U/s 405/406 of the IPC.

The offence of criminal breach of trust is punishable with imprisonment up to 3 years or fine or both. It is a cognizable, compoundable (up to Rs.250 only) and a non-bailable offence. If the value of the property in question is less than Rs.250, it is possible to compound the case with the permission of the Court. I am aware you know this part o0f the Law too,

Now legal remedies to your three question before us are as follows minus all social melodramatic replies you will come across by various non-legal repliers;

Remedy to 1: Yes, you and or your family is simply a trustee and you and your side of family should hand over her stridhan as and when demanded and infact there should not have been a demand for the same at all. If your family has already made seedhana paper work earlier then at the time of handing over this time do same paper work with two independent witnesses from both sides and respectfully hand over her stridhan. Matter closes. The proposed act of keeping stridhan as ransom for your wife’s return is no good before eyes of Law. Return of your wife is governed by separate set of legal views and for the same ld. brother Bharat hinted on RCR. Whether you succeed in it and whether she returns back is also difficult to predict / forecast on a silver piece of reply today but then set of law are there for return of wife which one may use instead of bargaining piggy riding on her truly rights - stridhan. In my opinion you mixed two grave issues and needs clarity on this which is mentioned in this large piece of reply as remedy.

Remedy no. 2: As theory your question (read as attitude) may sound rosy thinking that no complaint till date but when the “reality of a live complaint” hits a normal family then the after tune is different believe us on this legal precaution part. Having said so, simple precautions which are already explained in opening reply in this reply are good enough for you to take. Sometimes spouse need to let go some materials to bring back harmony without ipso facto cloudy judgmental decisions taken in haste.


Remedy 3: The legal remedy is RCR to bring wife back but it is a paper remedy more so for a un-willing spouse to rejoin cohabitation. Divorce should be last option after exhausting all social remedies (evidentiary not simply ha ji kiya tha nahi chalega before court of Law) and the more a normal family is away from legal matters the better harmony in society prevails is my view otherwise we the lawyers are there na.  

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[BTW it is nobody’s cause title to question “boss 100 pounds gold as stridhan is too much gold flowing around in matrimonial market now -a- days" but then some Indian weddings are always graciously fat hai ki nahi Chandrashekhar ji J ]

 tabjobs.  Well explained.  Endorse your views.  100 pounds to my knowledge is 45 kgs of gold. I think that is typing error.

@ Chandrashekhar

Ayyo Rama aissa typo nahi hota ji. Recently / past fortnight in LCI when my oh mai many females were missing my replies, actually we were invited at a Mallu wedding in apun ka Kerala witness to one such 100 pound alleged typo ji 

Aissa bhi hota hai wedding mein bus simple precaution lene ka ji

So, see I never talk in Legal platforms in thin vaccum

Yes Sir. Typing error. Its 100powns. i.e 800grams.

@Satyanarayanan.  I understood it is typing error becuase you mentioned your wife is having seethanam of Rs.1 crore. 45 kg of gold values more than one crore I think.  I am not as busy as tabjobsindia so I can remember facts relating to case better.