'Cat named Daisy drove everyone crazy': Amused at case of stolen feline, Karnataka HC quashes complaint

Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday quashed proceedings against a person accused of wrongfully holding a neighbour's domesticated cat in his house.

"Cat named Daisy drove everyone crazy," Justice M Nagaprasanna orally observed while allowing the petition filed by Taha Husain, a resident of Shikaripalya in Anekal taluk.

Nikitha Anjana Iyer, the owner of the cat, had filed a complaint in February 2022 stating that her cat had been missing and that it was a case of kidnapping. It was further alleged that her neighbour Taha Husain had wrongfully confined the cat after kidnapping. The complainant had further stated that she had been under unnecessary stress and emotional trauma as "she took care of the cat like her own child".

The police had filed the chargesheet for offences of intentional insult and criminal intimidation while dropping charges under IPC sections 428 and 429, which provide for punishment of all acts of cruelty such as killing, poisoning, maiming, or rendering animals useless.

Challenging the FIR and the charge sheet, the petitioner submitted that the CCTV footage, handed over to the police, clearly demonstrated that the cat was jumping from one window to another. He claimed that the cat never stayed on their premises. On the other hand, despite notices being served upon her, Nikitha remained unrepresented.

After examining the material, the court noted that the summary of the charge sheet contained retrospective embellishments, which even the complaint did not contain. The court said the charge sheet content about abuses and sexual actions made against the accused was not even mentioned in the complaint.

"It is not merely the present prosecution that warrants judicial censure; it is the symptomatic misuse of the criminal process, where hurt feelings or robust grievances masquerade as legal wrongs. If such frivolous grievances are allowed to blossom into a full-fledged criminal trial, it would be nothing but a waste of precious judicial time and, more gravely, diverting police resources from genuine grievances. If proceedings of this nature are permitted to continue, it would be a travesty and put a premium on the litigious persistence of the complainant, reducing the criminal justice system to conduct a trial in a melodrama woven around a cat," Justice Nagaprasanna said.

The court also admonished the police for swinging into a whimsical pursuit of justice for a cat. "Cases of this nature should serve as a gentle but firm reminder to all the stakeholders in the criminal justice system that the law is a solemn instrument and not a toy to be played with at the altar of personal pique," the court said.