After failing to make sense of the hypocrisy of Police and Judiciary on the fact that Dowry giving is equally punishable as much as Dowry taking under same section i.e., Section 3 of Dowry Prohibition Act 1961, so I decided to go in a different route.
The usual combo of offences that Police add to a FIR in a matrimonial crime is Section 498A IPC (Max Imprisonment is 3 years with fine) + Section 3 of DP Act (Imprisonment not less than five years with fine) + Section 4 of DP Act (Imprisonment not be less than six months, but which may extend to two years and with fine).
So, this time my attack is to target the larger offence in this combo i.e., Section 3 of DP Act (Imprisonment not less than five years with fine) and cripple the false Criminal matrimonial cases to half.
How to do that? I found one aspect from the DP Act itself that I can use to poke the eyes of devil of the false Criminal matrimonial cases. Section 8B of DP Act.
After some research and RTI applications, found that Government of Andhra Pradesh under G.O.Ms.No. 69 dt: 24-Jun-1989 and G.O.Ms.No. 117 dt: 12-Dec-1997, designated the Revenue Divisional Officers/Sub-Collectors take up cases under Dowry Prohibition Act 1961, instead of Police Department. Now, every tom, dick and happy in our Sunshine State knows that the Revenue Divisional Officers/Sub-Collectors in our State are NOT taking up cases under Dowry Prohibition Act 1961 due to ignorance or reluctance. Quite a nice bit of realization that this deserves a PIL to fix it! Hence this PIL.
Here is the Petition copy:
2025-07-08 Dowry Prohibition Officers under sec 8B of DPA v0.1Same attack to be done in Telangana and Karnataka too.
Index to all Goals here.