“Bigamy a serious offence:” Supreme Court awards 6 months jail to woman, second husband

Calling bigamy a serious offence, the Supreme Court has sentenced a woman and her second husband to six months in jail each.

The SC was hearing a petition filed by the woman's first husband challenging a Madras High Court order that had sentenced the couple for just a day till the "rising of the court".

While observing that bigamy was a "serious offence which impacts the society", the top court said that it's not advisable to let off the accused with a light sentence.

The woman remarried while her divorce proceedings were still pending before the family court. However, to ensure that the couple's six-year-old child is taken care off, the Court ordered, in a first, that the husband will serve his sentence first and after he completes his term, the woman will surrender.

"This arrangement shall not be treated as a precedent as it was ordered in these special circumstances," the top court asserted.

The court said that a "flea-bite sentence" by the Madras HC was inadequate for a serious offence.

"In the matter of awarding sentence for conviction of an offence which may impact the society, it is not advisable to let off an accused after conviction with a flea-bite sentence ... in the absence of any exceptional circumstances, [Courts must] impose sentence in tune with the rule of proportionality in providing punishment though it falls within the realm of judicial discretion." it observed.