Why Shaadi.com founder got relief from SC: Romantic fraud and platform liability

Romance scam

The legal battle stemmed from a complaint filed by a Hyderabad-based female doctor. In January 2025, she registered on Shaadi.com and connected with a male user.

According to the first information report (FIR) registered at the Jubilee Hills Police Station, the man presented himself as a wealthy individual, but claimed his bank accounts had been frozen by the Income Tax Department due to PAN card issues. Over the course of a few weeks, promising marriage and claiming his mother was flying in from Chicago to finalise their alliance, he allegedly induced the woman to transfer almost 11 lakh rupees to various bank accounts.

When the meeting with the “mother” never happened and the woman demanded her money back, the man allegedly threatened to morph her photographs and circulate them on social media unless she paid him ten lakh rupees more.

How Mittal got implicated

Initially, the FIR registered on February 25, 2025, did not name Mittal and was directed against only the alleged fraudster. However, during the investigation, the Hyderabad Police booked Mittal.

The police contended that Shaadi.com had failed to properly verify the accused user’s credentials. The investigation officer alleged that the platform and its executives “cheated people who trusted them by taking money from them without knowing whether the details were correct or not.” The police sought to hold the platform’s management criminally liable for the fraudulent actions of its user, citing a failure in their verification protocols – specifically regarding the lack of a government ID check or a ‘blue tick’ verification for the profile of the accused man.

Mittal was charged under various sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), including Section 318(4) – which punishes cheating – and Section 316(2) – which penalises criminal breach of trust, alongside provisions of the Information Technology (IT) Act that punish identity theft and “cheating by personation”.

‘Intermediary’ defence

Mittal’s legal team, led by Senior Advocate Atmaram Nadkarni, argued that holding the CEO personally liable for the crime of a user of his platform was legally unsustainable.

Their primary defence rested on Section 79 of the IT Act, which provides “safe harbour” protection to “intermediaries” – commonly used to refer to online platforms that host third-party content. The provision states that an intermediary is generally not liable for information or data made available by third parties, provided the platform observes “due diligence”.

Mittal’s petition highlighted that Shaadi.com acts merely as a matchmaker, akin to newspaper matrimonial classifieds. The petition pointed out that the platform has explicit “Be Safe Online” guidelines and a user agreement that warns members against sharing financial details or transferring money to strangers. Since the financial transactions and the alleged fraud occurred off the platform, via WhatsApp and bank transfers, Mittal argued he could not be held vicariously liable.

High Court ruling

Mittal had approached the Telangana High Court seeking to quash the FIR against him.

On April 24, 2025, the High Court disposed of his petition without deciding on whether the charges against him were legally valid. Instead, the High Court noted that the alleged offences carried a punishment of less than seven years.

Referring to the Supreme Court’s landmark Arnesh Kumar ruling guidelines – which aim to prevent unnecessary arrests in cases carrying sentences of less than seven years – the High Court directed the police to issue a notice to Mittal rather than immediately arresting him. It directed Mittal to cooperate with the investigation but refused to quash the case itself.

Supreme Court intervention

Mittal appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that the High Court had failed to exercise its jurisdiction. His counsel contended that even if the police were directed not to arrest him immediately, he was still being forced to face a criminal investigation and potential trial for a crime he had no connection with.

The Supreme Court agreed with this submission, observing that the High Court had not recorded any submissions on the “merits of the quashing” – that is, it had failed to examine whether the allegations in the FIR, even if taken as true, actually constituted a crime committed by Mittal. It held that a court cannot dismiss a quashing petition solely because the potential punishment is light; it must determine if the accused should be prosecuted at all.

The court set aside the High Court’s order and returned the case to the High Court, directing it to hear the matter again and decide specifically on whether the FIR against Mittal should be quashed based on the law and facts.

To ensure Mittal is not harassed during this process, the Supreme Court granted him interim protection from arrest for eight weeks.