Consensual Relationship With Married Woman Under False Pretext of Marriage Cannot Sustain Rape Conviction Under Section 376 IPC

The Appellant was convicted by the Trial Court under Section 376 of the IPC for allegedly sexually exploiting the victim (P.W.5) for three years on a false pretext of marriage

The prosecution alleged the Appellant kept the victim in a rented house and treated her as his wife, but later refused to marry her under parental pressure

Evidence revealed the victim was already married with two children, and no legal divorce from her first husband had been finalized

The medical report assessed the victim to be over 20 years old and found no signs of forceful rape, noting she was habitual to sexual intercourse

The Appellant challenged the conviction before the High Court

1. Whether a long-term consensual relationship can be termed as rape under Section 376 IPC if the promise of marriage was technically impossible to fulfill due to the victim's existing marriage

2. Whether the consent obtained for physical intimacy was vitiated by fraud or "misconception of fact" under the circumstances

Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which defines the offense of rape and requires that the act be committed without the victim's consent or that consent be obtained through fraud/misconception of fact

The doctrine of "Consensual Relationship," which distinguishes between a breach of promise to marry and a false promise intended to deceive from the inception

The Court observed that both the Appellant and the victim were majors who lived as husband and wife for over three years

Crucially, the Court noted that the victim was still legally married to her first husband during the period of the alleged exploitation, as her divorce petition had not culminated in a decree

The Court reasoned that a "false pretext of marriage" could not be justified or sustained as a ground for vitiating consent because the victim, being already married, was legally aware that a second marriage could not immediately take place

The relationship was found to be long-standing and consensual; the mere refusal to marry after such a period does not retroactively turn consensual intimacy into rape

The High Court allowed the appeal, quashed the Judgment of conviction dated 15.03.2019 and the Order of sentence dated 19.03.2019, and discharged the Appellant from his bail bonds