New Delhi: Describing him as a “wolf in sheep’s clothing”, a special Lucknow court has sentenced an advocate to life imprisonment for orchestrating a series of false rape and caste atrocity cases over five years using the Aadhaar card and other documents of a Dalit woman, his wife’s employee.
The court found that Parmanand Gupta (55) exploited Pooja Rawat (now 22), a poor Dalit woman, to lodge 29 FIRs related to fabricated rape cases in Barabanki and Lucknow against his rivals in property disputes, and pocketed the compensation money. Eighteen of these cases are in the trial stage.
These false cases were filed by Gupta between 2020 and 2025.
Accordig to the case detail, Rawat said she knew about some of these cases, while some were filed without her knowledge. She said she was involved in filing some of these cases under the stringent Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act in the hope of getting compensation money.
The 94-page order, delivered in Hindi by special judge (SC/ST Act) Vivekanand Sharan Tripathi 19 August, comes after months of inquiry and a trial that exposed one of the most shocking instances of systematic misuse of protective laws in recent years.
The entire plot began unravelling when Arvind Yadav, who was one of the people accused by Rawat of gangrape and molestation, filed a petition in the Allahabad High Court in January this year, seeking to quash the FIR and prevent any coercive action against him.
Incidentally, Yadav was also involved in a property dispute with the Gupta couple.
While hearing the petition, the high court noted the serious allegations regarding Parmanand Gupta filing numerous complaints and FIRs using Pooja Rawat’s documents.
The high court noted the cases appear to be part of an extortion racket designed to exploit protective provisions of the SC/ST Act. On 5 March, a division bench of the high court ordered a CBI probe into the pattern of these cases and complaints, directing the agency to submit a report by 10 April.
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Beauty salon & property disputes
The CBI investigation traced Rawat’s background to a beauty salon owned by Gupta’s wife, Sangeeta. Rawat, a 2nd-year B.A. student, worked at the salon to earn a livelihood. It emerged that the Guptas persuaded her to misuse her caste identity to lodge false complaints, particularly targeting rivals in property disputes involving Sangeeta.
A critical example was a case registered at the Vibhuti Khand police station in Lucknow, where Rawat accused two men, Arvind Yadav and Avdhesh Yadav, of gangrape and offences under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, Information Technology Act, and SC/ST Act.
Because the FIR involved offences under the SC/ST Act, the investigation was entrusted to Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Radharam Singh, as the rank mandated by law. His meticulous probe combined scientific analysis with field inquiries.
ACP Singh’s investigation quickly dismantled the allegations. Rawat’s medical report showed no injuries, she declined further tests, and her call records suggested she was not at the location of the alleged crime at the relevant time.
Police also talked to local witnesses and concluded that the case was entirely fabricated.
On 1 April 2025, Singh submitted a final report confirming the gangrape allegations were fabricated and recommending prosecution of both Rawat and Gupta.
The trial court later lauded Singh’s work, stating his investigation “saved innocent men from wrongful conviction and a potential life sentence”. Judge Tripathi noted that had the investigation been casual, the accused in the fabricated gangrape case would likely have been condemned unjustly.
During the trial, Rawat admitted via her legal aid that she had been coerced into filing these complaints. She also admitted she had been coerced into giving false statements of sexual assault before a magistrate and pleaded for pardon.
“Parmanand Gupta, the advocate, took my Aadhaar card, photos, income certificate, caste certificate, residence proof, and PAN card under the pretext of correction. Using these, he filed a case in my name without my knowledge,” she told the Court.
She said Gupta and his wife had also taken her signatures on blank papers, promising money in return for lodging false cases.
She further revealed that no gangrape had taken place and that Gupta had pocketed whatever money was received from these false litigations. On the basis of her testimony, the court granted her a pardon as an approver, though it sternly warned her against misusing the law again.
On 19 August, she was let go with a warning that any future misuse of the law would invite severe punishment.
Life sentence for advocate
Parmanand Gupta was convicted under multiple provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and the SC/ST Act, and was awarded lifetime imprisonment and a fine of more than Rs 5 lakhs. The court also recommended disciplinary action against him by the Bar Council of Uttar Pradesh, including cancellation of his licence.
Judge Tripathi observed that Gupta had “stained the respected legal profession” and acted as a “wolf in sheep’s clothing,” exploiting vulnerable individuals for personal gain and misleading the judiciary.
Beyond punishing Gupta, the court issued strong directions to plug loopholes in the system. The police were directed to disclose any prior cases filed by the complainant or family when filing FIRs in rape/atrocity cases. Plus, AI tools should be developed to detect repeated filings.
The Lucknow district magistrate was directed to recover compensation already paid to Rawat. Future compensation should be released only after filing of the chargesheet, except in emergencies, said the judge.
The bar councils were further directed to take disciplinary action against Gupta and improve ethical standards among new lawyers.
The judge also warned against the increasing trend of false cases under the SC/ST Act, stressing that while the law protects Dalits and Adivasis, its misuse risks eroding public trust and harming genuine survivors.
The court meticulously underlined the risks of allowing the justice system to be misused by unscrupulous litigants and lawyers, noting that genuine and false complainants often stand in the same queue before the courts, and without safeguards, public faith in the judiciary could collapse.
The judge added that misconduct of this scale by a practicing lawyer not only endangered innocent lives but also posed a direct threat to the credibility of the legal profession.
The judgement ended with a stark reminder of a foundational principle of criminal jurisprudence, “Though 100 culprits may escape, no innocent person should be punished.”
(Edited by Ajeet Tiwari)
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