In a dramatic turn of events, a woman who had been ‘missing’ for 18 years was produced before the Madhya Pradesh High Court earlier this week, leading to the court imposing a fine on her husband for deceitfully filing a petition. The woman, now 50, had disappeared in 2006 with her two sons due to her husband’s alleged brutality, only to resurface in a court hearing that shed light on the longstanding domestic abuse she suffered.
The husband, Nandkishore Rahangdale, had filed a petition last month requesting the court to direct police to locate his wife and sons, claiming they vanished from Kharpadia village in Balaghat district on April 18, 2006. Despite a police complaint filed a month after their disappearance, their whereabouts remained unknown until the court intervened following Rahangdale’s recent petition.
Upon the court’s order on July 28, Balaghat Police, under Superintendent Sameer Saurabh, launched an intensive investigation involving interviews with about 70 people. This effort ultimately led to locating the woman, who was then produced before the High Court in Jabalpur.
During the hearing, the woman testified that she fled her matrimonial home to escape her husband’s frequent and severe beatings, which also targeted their children. Tragically, she revealed that her younger son, Mukund, died shortly after they fled.
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Justice Vishal Dhagat of the High Court, addressing the woman’s harrowing account, noted her testimony and dismissed Rahangdale’s petition with a fine of Rs 10,000. The judge criticized the petitioner for his awareness of the circumstances under which his wife left and for abusing the court’s process by filing a baseless petition. The court emphasized that the police’s resources were unnecessarily expended to address a situation the petitioner knew the truth of all along.
