Plant 50 Trees In One Month: Court Tells Man Accused Of Sexual Harassment To Drop Criminal Proceedings

A man in Uttarakhand accused of sexually harassing a woman was asked to plant 50 trees as a condition to dismiss the ongoing criminal proceedings against him, Live Law reported.

Passing the order, the Uttarakhand High Court said, "But, composition in itself should carry a lesson for the applicant that in future he would not engage himself in such types of offences and he should reckon how to acknowledge the sanctity of a friendly relationship."

The report claims that the accused had befriended a woman on Facebook. As the days passed by, he allegedly sent indecent and objectionable videos and photographs to the complainant.

The victim then filed a complaint and the fiR was lodged under Section 354A of the IPC and Section 67 and 67A of the Information Technology Act.

The applicant, feeling aggrieved by the commencement of criminal proceedings, approached the High Court under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, with the aim of halting the entire criminal process.

After filing the petition for quashing, an interim application was submitted, indicating that both parties desired to compound the offenses. In this regard, the parties filed an affidavit. During the proceedings, the Court had an interaction with the complainant, who expressed her willingness to drop the case as the applicant had apologized to her, and she had duly accepted the apology.

"...looking to the nature and gravity of offences and also coupled with the fact, that the parties have close affinity with one another, owing to their relationship which they have developed on Facebook, coupled with the fact, that the applicant was known to the family members of the complainant, in order to maintain peace and harmony amongst themselves, the Compounding Application is required to be considered by this Court in the exercise of its powers under Section 482 of CrPC," The Single Bench of Justice Sharad Kumar Sharma said.

However, the court, before passing the latest order, directed the accused to plant 50 trees with the help of the Horticulture Department in a span of one month.

"It is only upon the submission of the certificate of the planting of the fifty trees to be issued by the competent authority of the Horticulture Department, which has to be submitted before the competent court ceased with the criminal proceedings, its then only the proceedings would be dropped," the Court ordered.