The Karnataka High Court has refused to quash a criminal case against a Bengaluru couple accused of allegedly receiving ₹1.40 crore on the assurance of securing an MBBS seat for a complainant’s daughter.
Justice M. Nagaprasanna held that the allegations in the complaint, if taken at face value at this stage, prima facie disclose the ingredients of criminal breach of trust and cheating. The Court said the investigation could not be stopped merely because the dispute involved a monetary transaction.
According to the complaint, the complainant met the first accused at Prakriya Hospital in Bengaluru in February 2023. The complaint stated that Aravali represented that she and her husband had influential contacts in private medical colleges and could help secure an MBBS seat for the complainant’s daughter, who had appeared for NEET in 2023 but could not secure admission in a Government Medical College
The complainant alleged that ₹35 lakh was initially paid in cash. She subsequently transferred another ₹1.05 crore through RTGS transactions to the second accused’s bank account. The complaint therefore placed the total amount at ₹1.40 crore. It was further alleged that the daughter’s academic and personal documents were collected in connection with the purported admission process.
The complaint stated that the promised admission did not materialise. According to the complainant, after receiving the money, the petitioners continued to delay the process and later failed to return the amount despite repeated demands.
The petitioners argued that the dispute was essentially a money-recovery matter and that criminal proceedings had been initiated after considerable delay. The State opposed the petitions, maintaining that investigation was necessary.
The High Court rejected the argument that the matter could be treated merely as a civil dispute.
“The submission that the proceedings are merely a coercive device for recovery of money, therefore, cannot become a talisman by the mere utterance of the expression ‘civil dispute’. Every transaction involving money does not, by that circumstance alone, shed its criminal complexion. Where the very foundation of the transaction is alleged to have been laid in deception and the victim is induced to part with property on a representation which, from its inception, is alleged to have been dishonest, the cloak of a civil transaction cannot be permitted to smother a legitimate criminal investigation.”
The Court further observed that the allegations prima facie disclosed the ingredients of criminal breach of trust and cheating, including alleged inducement and deception at the beginning of the transaction.
Justice Nagaprasanna held that the delay in approaching the police and the claim that the proceedings were intended only for recovery of money could not justify stopping the investigation at its initial stage. Finding no merit in the petitions, the Karnataka High Court rejected both criminal petitions.
Case Title: Shilpa Aravali v. State of Karnataka & Another with Kiran Kumar P v. State of Karnataka & Another
Case Number: Criminal Petition No. 10705 of 2026 c/w Criminal Petition No. 10794 of 2026
Judge: Hon’ble Mr. Justice M. Nagaprasanna
Decision Date: August 12, 2026
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