Chandigarh: The Punjab and Haryana high court has made it clear that a blanket rule treating all Section 498-A (harassment for dowry) convictions as morally turpitudinous is legally unsustainable. HC was of the view that the concept of moral turpitude depends on the nature, context, and gravity of the act, not merely the existence of a conviction.“With all humility at my command, a careful distinction becomes necessary, on the one hand, between the genuine cases of egregious dowry-related cruelty which shock the collective conscience of the society as a whole, and, on the other hand, prosecutions arising out of essentially personal disputes within the precincts of the matrimonial home, which may culminate in compromise, acquittal, or even conviction based on findings of only technical or marginal cruelty,” Justice Sandeep Moudgil of the HC has held.In his detailed order, Justice Moudgil also explained that categorisation of a particular case under Section 498-A IPC may or may not involve moral turpitude depends on its own facts and is always debatable, and reasonable people may differ on that question. What cannot be accepted, however, is any general rule that every offence under Section 498-A IPC, by its very nature, must automatically be translated into an offence involving moral turpitude for the purpose of civil consequences such as employment, promotion or higher education.Justice Moudgil passed these orders while allowing a writ petition filed by Brahmjeet Kaushal, a former branch manager, challenging his discharge from service by a public sector bank.Kaushal had been convicted under Section 498-A IPC in a matrimonial dispute dating to 2000, while being acquitted of more serious charges under sections 304-B (dowry death) and 406 IPC. Following the upholding of his conviction by higher courts, the bank terminated his services in 2019, citing rules that bar employment of individuals convicted of offences involving moral turpitude.After hearing his plea, the HC found that the bank acted mechanically in dismissing the officer solely on the basis of conviction, without assessing whether the offence met the legal threshold of “moral turpitude”. The judge held that on a plain reading of Section 498-A IPC, the “gravamen” of the offence is “cruelty” inflicted upon a wife by her husband or his relatives.“The law does not proceed on sweeping generalities of this kind. It demands a fact-sensitive inquiry into the nature, degree and context of the cruelty actually proved in a given case, and it is only where those facts disclose genuine moral depravity, rather than merely a strained matrimonial relationship, that the label of an offence involving moral turpitude can legitimately be imposed,” Justice Moudgil said.
