Case – S. Varadarajan v. State of Madras, 1965
Fact
S. Natarajan was living on 6th Street, Lake Area, Nungumbakkam, along with his wife and two daughters, Rama and Savitri. Rama was studying in the Madras Medical College while the Savitri was a student of the second year B.Sc. class in Ethiraj College. A few months before her 18th birthday Savitri became friendly with S. Varadarajan who was residing in a house next door to that of S. Natarajan.
Savitri and Varadarajan fell in love with each other and wanted to get married. When Natrajan came to know about this, he took Savitri to Kodambakkam and left her at the house of a relative, the idea being that she should be kept as far away from S. Varadarajan as possible for some time.
On the next day, Savitri left the house of her relative at about 10.00 A.M. and telephoned the appellant asking him to meet her on a certain road in that area and then went to that road herself. By the time she got there, S. Varadarajan had arrived there in his car. She got into it and both of
them then went to the house of one P. T. Sami at Mylapore with a view to taking that person along with them to the Registrar’s office to witness their marriage.
Thereafter the agreement to marry entered between S. Varadarajan and Savitri, which was apparently written there, was got registered. Later, S. Varadarajan was arrested for kidnapping of Savitri.
Issue
Had S. Varadarajan committed kidnapping of Savitri?
Contentions & Judgement:
There are four conditions must be proved to make any person liable for kidnapping:
- (i) Taking or enticing – In this case there was neither taking nor enticing. There was merely allowing.
- (ii) Minor (In case of female, under the age of 18 Yrs.) – Savitri was minor.
- (iii) Out of lawful guardian – Though Savitri had been left by S. Natarajan at the house of his relative K. Natarajan, she still continued in the lawful keeping of the former.
- (iv) Without consent – S. Natarajan had not given consent.
- In this case Savitri was on the verge of attaining the age of maturity. She was well educated. She was student of second year of B.Sc. She was living in urban area. She was capable of knowing what is right and what is wrong. She called lover and she chose the meeting point. There was no pre-planning. S. Varadarajan had neither administered threat nor blandishment. So, he had only acted to fulfill her desire.
- She willingly accompanied him, and the law did not cast upon him the duty of taking her
back to her father’s house or even of telling her not to accompany him.
- Supreme Court observed, “In our, opinion if evidence to establish one of those things is lacking it would not be legitimate to infer that the accused is guilty of taking the minor out of the keeping of the lawful guardian merely because after she has actually left her guardian’s house or a house where her guardian had kept her, joined the accused and the accused helped her in her design not to return to her guardian’s house by taking her along with him from place to place”.
- There is not a word in the deposition of Savitri from which an inference could be drawn that she left the house of K Natarajan at the instance or even a suggestion of the appellant. Savitri has stated that she had decided to marry the appellant and insisted the appellant accordingly.
- In this case, there was no taking. S. Varadrajan was acquitted. There was no offence under section 363, IPC.
