The Allahabad High Court on Tuesday put a stay on the arrest of cricketer Yash Dayal in an FIR case accusing him of sexually exploiting a woman.
A bench of Justices Siddhartha Varma and Anil Kumar stayed Dayal’s arrest while hearing his plea challenging the FIR. The court directed the state counsel to submit a counter affidavit and issued a notice to the complainant to file her response.
The FIR against the 27-year-old, who plays for Royal Challengers Bengaluru in the IPL, was registered on July 6 at Indirapuram police station in Ghaziabad. He has been booked under Section 69 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita for allegedly sexually exploiting a woman on the pretext of marriage.
The petitioner's counsel submitted that a person can be accused of an offence under Section 69 of BNS only if it is established that he makes a promise to marry to a woman without any intention to fulfill it.
He argued that a plain reading of the FIR shows the informant had been in a relationship with him for the past five years.
His counsel further claimed that she remained silent for a long time and lodged the FIR only after his selection in the Indian cricket team, with an oblique motive to extort onerous and arbitrary demands.
He said the petitioner during the course of the relationship had provided financial support to the informant.
The counsel argued that the petitioner never made any false promises to the informant. He added that the FIR does not indicate the petitioner engaged in sexual intercourse through deceitful means. Instead, he claimed, the complaint was filed only after the relationship between the two soured.
The additional government advocate submitted that, according to the FIR, the petitioner had been physically exploiting the informant for the past five years and had introduced her to his family under the pretext of marriage.
The way the petitioner involved the informant with his family indicates that he was making a false promise of marriage.
The court stated, "We have perused the FIR, from which it is apparent that relationship between the parties continued for a span of five years. At this stage, it is difficult to ascertain whether there was any promise of marriage or if there was any such promise, it was a false one from the very beginning with an intention to obtain sexual consent. The matter requires consideration."
"Till the next date of listing or till the submission of police report, whichever is earlier, the petitioner shall not be arrested," the court added.
In his plea, Dayal requested both a stay on his arrest and the dismissal of the FIR registered against him.
The complainant stated that she met Dayal around five years ago and that he had promised to marry her. She claimed he kept delaying the proposal and that she later discovered he was involved with other women too.
The complaint was initially submitted on June 21 via the chief minister's online grievance portal (IGRS).
With PTI Inputs
