{"id":2040,"date":"2024-06-26T16:10:31","date_gmt":"2024-06-26T10:40:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/?p=2040"},"modified":"2024-06-26T17:17:28","modified_gmt":"2024-06-26T11:47:28","slug":"karnataka-hc-holds-that-a-woman-who-is-a-victim-of-prostitution-should-not-be-punished-for-offences-punishable-under-section-5-of-the-immoral-traffic-prevention-act-1956","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/karnataka-hc-holds-that-a-woman-who-is-a-victim-of-prostitution-should-not-be-punished-for-offences-punishable-under-section-5-of-the-immoral-traffic-prevention-act-1956\/","title":{"rendered":"Karnataka HC holds that a woman who is a victim of prostitution should not be punished for offences punishable under Section 5 of the Immoral Traffic Prevention Act, 1956"},"content":{"rendered":"

MRS. SWATHI\u00a0 [<\/strong>PETITIONER] Vs. <\/strong>THE STATE OF KARNATAKA\u00a0 [<\/strong>RESPONDENTS]<\/h1>\n

CRIMINAL PETITION NO. 807 OF 2024<\/p>\n

(Delivered by THE HON’BLE MR JUSTICE M.NAGAPRASANNA<\/strong>)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Facts:<\/u><\/strong> The petitioner\/accused No.8 is before this Court calling in question proceedings in C.C.No.1397\/2013 pending before the Additional Civil Judge and JMFC, Kundapura arising out of crime in Crime No.16\/2013 registered for offence punishable under Section 5 of the Immoral Traffic Prevention Act, 1956<\/p>\n

Issue:<\/u><\/strong> Whether that a woman who is a victim of prostitution should be punished for offences punishable under Section 5 of the Immoral Traffic Prevention Act, 1956?<\/p>\n

Arguments on behalf of counsel for petitioner:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

The learned counsel appearing for the petitioner would vehemently contend that the petitioner is the victim of prostitution at the hands of other accused and, therefore, the petitioner should not be permitted to be prosecuted. The learned counsel has projected several legal lacunae to buttress his submission that the entire proceedings are illegal.<\/p>\n

Arguments on behalf of counsel for respondents:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

The learned Additional State Public Prosecutor would refute the submissions to contend that the case is now 10 years old and the petitioner should not now be permitted to knock at the doors of this Court even if she is a victim. She should come out clean in a trial. He would seek dismissal of the petition.<\/p>\n

Held:<\/u><\/strong> The court allowed the present petition and held that, \u201cThe High Court of Bombay<\/a> holds that it would become an abuse of the process of law, on the face of it, if the victim is permitted to be prosecuted for the offence under the Act, when the Act nowhere punishes the victim of prostitution. As said, the provisions, the purpose or the object of the Act is not to abolish prostitution or the prostitute. There is no provision under the law, which penalizes a victim who indulges in prostitution. What is punishable is sexual exploitation for commercial purposes and to earn or make a living upon it against such person\/s. In the light of the admitted fact that the petitioner\/accused No.8 is a victim and notwithstanding the fact that she is a victim of prostitution, if further trial is permitted to continue it would become an abuse of the process of law and result in patent injustice.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MRS. SWATHI\u00a0 [PETITIONER] Vs. THE STATE OF KARNATAKA\u00a0 [RESPONDENTS] CRIMINAL PETITION NO. 807 OF 2024 (Delivered by THE HON’BLE MR JUSTICE M.NAGAPRASANNA)   Facts: The petitioner\/accused No.8 is before this Court calling in question proceedings in C.C.No.1397\/2013 pending before the Additional Civil Judge and JMFC, Kundapura arising out of crime in Crime No.16\/2013 registered for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2042,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2040","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-judgement"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2040"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2040\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2046,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2040\/revisions\/2046"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}