Thirty-four years after the death of 20-year-old Kanchanbala from 100 per cent burn injuries, and 27 years after her case led to changes in the dowry law, the Delhi High Court has upheld the conviction of her husband for abetment to suicide.

In a verdict on the eve of Women's Day earlier this month, the court linked it to his demand for a scooter made two days before Kanchanbala's death. Subhash Chandra now faces a non-bailable warrant and has been asked to surrender by March 19.

Kanchanbala's mother Satya Rani Chaddha is in her 80s now, battling cancer and barely able to understand that her fight for justice may finally be nearing end. However, perhaps she lives with the satisfaction that during that fight  that reverberated in courts and Parliament  she brought about two vital amendments in the anti-dowry law that have gone a long way towards preventing cases like her daughter's.

The first amendment, made in 1983, changed the definition of dowry in the law to include any demand for gifts at any time during the marriage. A police investigation had earlier cleared Chandra of charges under the anti-dowry law on the ground that the demand for a scooter had been made post-wedding (specifically, during Kanchanbala's pregnancy; she was six and a half months pregnant at the time of her death). The high court has now termed the police probe "tainted".

The second amendment that owes itself to Chaddha's perseverance is Section 113 A of the Indian Evidence Act (of 1986), under which abetment to suicide is now presumed if a married woman kills herself within seven years of marriage and if her husband/in-laws had subjected her to cruelty.

Apart from fighting to have Chandra convicted in court, Chaddha also formed NGO Shakti Shalini to fight for women's rights, along with Jahanara Apa who had similarly lost her daughter to dowry.

Earlier, Chaddha went regularly to Shahdara court for the hearings, but by the time it went into appeal and age and illness caught on, she lost the will and the energy. Lawyers' Collective through advocate Sanjoy Ghose fought on her behalf.

In its March 7 verdict, the Delhi High court noted: "This also appears to be a classic case where the investigation is tainted; the investigating agency which is the police and upon whom every citizen of the country looks for protection did not appear to have performed its obligations. So much so that initially the police had also sought to file a cancellation report, but that was not taken up as the mother of the victim who appeared to be running from pillar to post to see that the culprits are brought to book, had meanwhile filed a private complaint on which cognisance was taken."

It went on: "Investigation is clearly shoddy... sealed parcels were sent for scientific examination but surprisingly what was picked up for scientific examination were innocuous articles i.e. wooden blocks containing planks forming a part of the door. The investigating agency had intentionally and deliberately, to shield the accused, not picked up the hair, nails or the viscera of the victim. The samples of kerosene, match box, stove or any other article lying at the scene of the incident were also not sent for any forensic analysis. The investigating officer who had retired has in fact come to the rescue of the appellant and has deposed as a defence witness. The callous approach adopted by the investigating agency deserves to be condemned."

The trial court too had earlier noted the failure of the investigating agency to perform its duty.

Chaddha, who now stays with her son in Rohini, struggles to register the significance of the high court's verdict, but what remains vivid in her memory is that Chandra married again, and her last meeting with her daughter.

"She came to see me on the 15th (15.3.1979) and said do not give me any gifts when this baby is born, just give a scooter. I said I will give it once the baby is born. But he (Chandra) could not wait. Two days later, she was lying there dead. He killed my child and then said he did not know anything about it," she says, before breaking down and saying, "I failed her, I killed her."

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