New Delhi: The Delhi High Court reprimanded a mother for allegedly using her minor daughter to pursue personal vendettas against her estranged husband by filing a case under the POCSO Act. The court dismissed her plea to include the girl’s grandmother and paternal aunts as accused.
On September 2, Justice Arun Monga remarked, “This case is particularly concerning because the mother appears to have exploited her own child to further a personal conflict, leveraging the child’s vulnerability for her own ends. Such conduct undermines both the fairness of the legal process and the gravity of offences under the POCSO Act, effectively turning them into instruments of personal retaliation.” The court also imposed a fine of Rs 20,000 on her.
In 2020, the woman lodged an FIR accusing her husband and the girl’s cousins of sexually abusing her daughter. She later approached the Delhi High Court, challenging a trial court’s decision that had dismissed her petition under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.
Describing the move as a clear misuse of the judicial process, the single-judge bench noted, “What is presented as a quest for justice is, in truth, an attempt at coercion—aimed not at safeguarding the child but at pursuing personal vendettas driven by deep-seated hostility toward her husband.”
The judge observed that the attempt to involve the elderly grandmother and paternal aunts—who had no connection to the alleged incidents—revealed a deliberate effort to entangle innocent family members in lengthy criminal proceedings. While upholding the fine imposed by the trial court on the mother, the High Court increased it by an additional Rs 10,000 and dismissed her petition, terming it “unnecessary and vexatious litigation” and “a blatant misuse of the legal process.”
