Policeman Jailed for Bigamy After 30-Year Acquittal

In a significant legal development, the Calcutta High Court overturned a 1996 acquittal concerning a bigamy case, ordering a 75-year-old former policeman, Jibananda Chatterjee, to serve three years in prison. The court also mandated Rs 1 lakh in compensation for his second wife, Shasthi Chatterjee, noting the profound emotional and mental distress caused to both women involved.

This ruling addresses a case stemming from a marriage in 1984, where Shasthi discovered her husband had married another woman, Madhabi Roy, in 1983 under the Special Marriage Act. After Shasthi lodged a complaint in 1990, she was acquitted by the trial court in 1996, a decision that was later challenged in the High Court in 1997.

Justice Rajasekhar Mantha and Justice Ananya Bandopadhyay criticized the trial judge's "hypertechnical approach," stating that a marriage certificate issued under the Special Marriage Act definitively proves a marriage. The bench upheld the conviction under Section 495 of the Indian Penal Code, though it reduced the sentence from the maximum ten years to three, considering Chatterjee's age.