Christeen Ribillo v. Sub Inspector of Police
In the High Court of Kerala
B.A. 7203/2018
Before Justice Raja Vijayaraghavan V.
Decided on December 13, 2018

Relevancy of the case: Bail application for sending offensive and obscene messages on WhatsApp

Statutes and Provisions Involved

• The Information Technology Act, 2000 (Section 67)
• The Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (Section 438, 41A)
• The Kerala Police Act, 2011 (Section 120(o))
• The Indian Penal Code, 1860 (Section 34, 195A, 294, 506)

Relevant Facts of the Case

• The complainant married the second applicant in September 2013 and they later had a child too.
• Both the complainant and the second applicant started to live separately from 2016 onwards when their relationship started to strain.
• The second applicant was allegedly married to the first applicant as well.
• In August 2018, the first applicant allegedly sent obscene and offensive messages to the complainant on WhatsApp and also posted status messages to ridicule the complainant.

Prominent Arguments by the Advocates

• The applicants’ counsel submitted that Section 195A of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 was added later and was not present on the application.
• The public prosecutor contends that the complainant was threatened to withdraw the complaint.

Opinion of the Bench

• The court opined that bail should be granted to applicants with conditions, as there was no evidence.

Final Decision

• Application allowed.

This case summary has been prepared by Tuba Aftab, an undergraduate student at IIMT & School of Law, GGSIPU, during her internship with The Cyber Blog India in May/June 2021.