A recent Supreme Court judgment reflects a staggering 83,327 cases under the Dowry Prohibition Act that came up for trial in 2023. Notably, according to National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data, 63,516 dowry death cases were pending trial until 2024. Even a large number of recent high court rulings grappled with the issue of dowry demand or dowry deaths. Most recently, the case of Twisha Sharma—the 31-year-old actor-model found dead in her matrimonial home on May 12, 2026, just five months after marrying advocate Samarth Singh—has brought these critical issues to light.
In an exclusive chat, one of India’s foremost criminal law experts, Senior Advocate Amit Desai, particularly renowned for his expertise in high-profile criminal litigation such as the 2002 Salman Khan hit-and-run case, Aryan Khan drugs arrest case, and the 2G ‘scam’ case, draws from decades of high-stakes courtroom experience and breaks down the systemic challenges of investigating dowry cases, the delicate balance of preventing legislative misuse, and the legal reforms required to ensure true justice.
The Supreme Court took suo motu cognisance of the Twisha Sharma case, which was an individual case. Does it show that the issue of dowry needs a lot more introspection?
Amit Desai: The issue of the Dowry Prohibition Act has been troubling the fabric of our society for many years, even before Independence. And it actually takes us back to some of the core beliefs in various social structures that we have about the need for dowry.
Twisha Sharma and the mother-in-law trope in India
And it goes back, if you reflect upon it, as to where this whole issue of dowry began, how many hundreds of years ago, and how it got misused and morphed even in those few hundred years. So whilst the origin of dowry may have been with a very salutary purpose that when a woman goes into the house of the husband if the parents of the girl actually send some gifts of money, it might be used for the maintenance of the wife in the new house in which she’s entering.
But then obviously it has morphed itself into a situation where in many situations marriage and demand for dowry, which is all linked to the inducement of marriage, became more a commoditised product than a social need to have a relationship between a man and a woman. And as a result of which, we have been reading enough literature for years about the fact as to how, for facilitating marriages, parents of girls would induce the boy’s side of the family to say that we will give you a certain amount of money or gifts for the purpose of getting married to our daughter.
Obviously, this was a serious social evil because that was never the intent or purpose of dowry. And it caused a lot of social storm, and this all probably goes back to issues that are more social issues going back hundreds of years, as to why it is that parents of women had to actually consider giving some amount of gifts and money as a dowry for the inducement of marriages.
The government recognised the evil of dowry introduced the Dowry Prohibition Act in 1961. Over time, this social evil could not be met, so the Act has gone through multiple amendments. But one reality being recognised by courts over the last 40-50 years is that this legislation has failed, and the criminal justice system has failed. And we have not been able to solve this problem of dowry.
The Supreme Court has very frequently recognised it as a failure of our criminal justice system. Something seriously needs to be done, and I hope that, in the context, once again, in 2026, this particular Twisha Sharma case has reached the Supreme Court.
It’s not so much about the case itself, but I do hope that the Supreme Court once again goes back into all its earlier observations on how the system has failed and finds ways and means to ensure that the system does not fail the woman when she faces these ills of dowry prohibition.
I just hope that this is once more another opportunity for the Supreme Court to lay down some very strict guidelines to ensure that the government discharges its obligations to ensure that the objects of this legislation are fully met and within a proper timeline.
What constitutes a dowry demand? What can fall under the ambit of a criminal offence?
Amit Desai: The social evil was essentially giving some form of gift on the occasion of marriage. Those gifts can fall into multiple parts. There are some gifts that are an essential part of the religious ceremony. For example, in some kind of in some communities, in Hindu communities and in Maharashtra, the mangalsutra is a very important part of the entire ceremony itself. You have to divide this and say which part of the gifts or item which are given in a marriage would be constituted as dowry and which would not.
What was inherently part of the religious ceremony itself obviously cannot be treated as dowry. But the definition of dowry in the Act was pretty wide and sometimes can give rise to even misuse. But still, it is a pretty wide definition because if you have to capture a social evil, sometimes when you legislate, you have to legislate in a much wider way to ensure that all these aspects are captured, because people might be very creative in the way in which they give gifts. Essentially, dowry is any kind of a gift, which is given in connection with the marriage of the parties, but does not include a dower or meher that is, of course, in relation to the personal law.
When you want something as wide as in connection with the marriage, it gives scope for a lot of interpretational issues about what is in connection with the marriage. Some of it may be just legitimate, and some of it may be in the nature of a demand.
The question is: how do you evolve this, and how do people, the agencies in fact, interpret the term in connection with the marriage? That is something that is probably a matter of a lot of debate and discussion as we go forward.
The Dowry Prohibition Act is of 1961, though we have BNS Section 80 dealing with dowry death. Do we need an amendment to the law, keeping in mind the societal and demographic changes? Or do we have an existing effective legislation lacking implementation?
Amit Desai: From 1961 to the present, in many forms, this problem about the dowry cases has been bothering legislation. Therefore, they came out with different forms of legislation to tackle this problem. Thus, the Dowry Prohibition Act, which didn’t deal with dowry death per se, just talked about the prohibition of giving dowry.
Obviously, so far as dowry death is concerned, in a way, technically, those deaths were covered under the general penal code in those years, and now the BNS (Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita), whether it was a murder, a suicide or any other form. However, it became necessary at some point to chisel out and say, ‘What is the meaning of a dowry death?’ Therefore, they created a separate offence, the old 304B (dowry death), but now it is Section 80 in the new BNS.
The Parliament said, “Let us send a signal to society that dowry death is a separate offence by itself.” So there’s a death that arises out of a demand for dowry, that becomes a separate offence.
Now, that could have been a murder, that could have been a suicide in two forms of death, but it’s a dowry death. So it was to send a message to society that now this is a separate offence. Now, and it is not uncommon that legislation very often tries to sharpen the nature of the offence so that it becomes important for society to recognise that this is now an offence which is not just a simple murder, but it is linked to dowry, so that those who actually demand dowry are made more conscious of the reality that if you demand dowry and there’s a death which results in it, then there’s a consequence which is very serious.
Therefore, this is about sending a message. In dowry prohibition, they increased the punishment. That also did not serve the purpose. Then they introduced dowry death. Then they introduced, in between, if you remember, Section 498A, which was cruelty. Cruelty, demand for dowry, is also a form of cruelty.
Then they introduced these special provisions under the Evidence Act, which created a presumption, because very often these are offences that are committed in secrecy. That is between a husband and a wife or in a family inside a house, and no eyewitnesses are available outside to actually see what was going on inside. So they said, “Okay, we’ll create some legal presumptions to try and strengthen the process.” Now, all this is being done legislatively in an attempt to try and ensure that these kinds of cases can be investigated and prosecuted properly.
Despite the efforts from 1961 to strengthen the law, to try and send a signal to society, the system has failed…as you rightly gave that staggering figure of outstanding cases in relation to dowry.
The question is whether such a large number of cases is still in the system. Think about it, and you ask the question as to whether there’s a need for any additional legislation. My view is that any amount of legislation ultimately does not, will not subserve any real purpose unless the criminal justice system is able to now quickly decide these cases. Set examples that these people prosecuted for dowry-related matters, whether it’s dowry prohibition, cruelty, dowry death, etc, they see the consequence of their acts quickly enough, and society too starts seeing the consequences quickly.
The real issue is to find ways to speed up. One is the quality of investigation and speeding up the trials so that a serious message goes to society that such offences will be fast-tracked because there are special provisions under the Evidence Act, and you will face serious consequences.
Remember, what is the purpose of legislation like this? Legislation can’t stop all social evils. It is the signal to society. Its intention is to create a sense of fear among those who indulge in these acts. What is happening is that if they realise that these cases are not going anywhere, then there’s no sense of fear left. So you have 1,000 cases that check the system. Instead, somebody else will say, “Okay, I have the luck of the draw. I may not get caught.”
This is where our system has to strengthen itself first. The legislation has a provision for making rules. What is the fundamental purpose of these rules? From a legislative perspective, there is a good intent. You say, in every state, in every district, there’ll be dowry prohibition officers. The role of the dowry prohibition officer is to first sensitise the community around him.
