A restraining order, commonly called an “RO”, is a court’s command that stops a person from doing something that invades someone else’s legal rights. In India, ROs are not a separate statute-bound concept like in the West but are rooted in civil injunctions under the Specific Relief Act, general provisions of the Civil Procedure Code, and in some cases, preventive measures under the Code of Criminal Procedure.
At its core, an RO safeguards the applicant’s peace of mind, personal liberty, or property. It may stop someone from trespassing, threatening, stalking, defaming or harassing. While people often link restraining orders to marital or domestic violence cases, courts have made it clear they’re not gender limited: anyone feeling threatened can ask the court to protect them.
Types of Restraining Orders
Though Indian law doesn’t label them as “types”, courts grant different forms of restraint depending on what’s needed. The first is a prohibitory injunction, which prevents someone from doing a wrongful act, for example, barring a neighbour from encroaching on your land. The second is a mandatory injunction that directs a person to undo a wrong, say, demolishing an illegal construction. In harassment or stalking disputes, prohibitory injunctions are the norm: the court stops the defendant from contacting, visiting, or communicating with the applicant.
In criminal law, Sections 144 and 107 of the CrPC empower magistrates to pass temporary orders to prevent nuisance or threat to life or property, which act like temporary restraining orders.
How to Obtain a Restraining Order
To get an RO, a person must file a civil suit seeking an injunction before the appropriate civil court, or approach a magistrate under criminal provisions if there’s an imminent threat. The petitioner must clearly show a prima facie right, a threat to that right, and that damages or other legal remedies won’t be enough to protect them.
Courts look for genuine urgency and proof: messages, emails, CCTV footage, witnesses, medical records if there’s violence. On this basis, the court may grant an interim injunction at the first hearing to prevent harm before the other side even appears. Later, after hearing both parties, the court decides whether to confirm it as a permanent injunction.
Challenging or Quashing an RO
A restraining order can be appealed like any other civil order under the Civil Procedure Code. If someone feels a trial court wrongly granted an injunction, they can file an appeal under Order 43 Rule 1 CPC. If there’s no appeal, one may file a revision petition or a writ under Article 226 or 227 of the Constitution, arguing that the lower court acted beyond its jurisdiction or violated natural justice.
In criminal restraining orders under Section 144 CrPC, a person can seek revision before a higher magistrate or approach the High Court to set it aside if the urgency or danger no longer exists. Courts will quash an RO if they find it was obtained on false grounds, without evidence, or if circumstances have changed so drastically that the order serves no purpose.
A Typical Restraining Order Case
A well-known example is Manju Jain v. Shashi Bhushan (Delhi HC, 2005). In this case, the plaintiff owned a house but her brother repeatedly tried to occupy it forcibly. She moved court seeking an injunction to restrain him from entering the property or disturbing her peaceful possession. The trial court granted an interim order barring him from entering the premises. The brother appealed, claiming co-ownership. The High Court found that she alone had title documents and bank records proving possession. The restraining order was upheld, with the court emphasizing that an injunction is justified where possession is proved and threatened by illegal force. This remains a classic template for property related ROs.
The Shift: Restraining Orders Against Women
What’s more recent and legally interesting is that Indian courts have begun passing restraining orders against women where men show they are being harassed, stalked or blackmailed. This is rare because the legal discourse in India has long focused on protecting women from violence, but courts now recognize that anyone can be a victim of harassment.
The most talked about recent example is the July 2025 order from Rohini Court in Mukesh Taneja v. Nancy Verma. Mukesh, a married man from Delhi, showed the court that Nancy, whom he had met at an ashram, was stalking him after he refused her proposal. He produced chats and CCTV footage to prove harassment, threats of suicide, and attempts to contact his children on social media. Seeing this, the court issued a 300 meter restraining order against Nancy and her husband, stopping them from coming near his home or contacting him by any means.
Another interesting one came out of the Kerala High Court in Nikhil v. Nandini (2022). Nikhil alleged that Nandini kept turning up at his house late at night, threatening to slap a false rape case on him if he did not marry her. The police refused to act on his complaint, so he approached the High Court for protection. The court ordered Nandini to stay away from his residence and workplace, recognizing his right to life and liberty under Article 21.
Likewise, in Dr. X v. Ms. Y (Bombay High Court, 2021), a male doctor claimed a woman blackmailed him with doctored intimate photos. He filed a civil suit for injunction and defamation. The court restrained Ms. Y from circulating any photos, contacting him, or defaming him online.
These orders show that courts are slowly acknowledging that harassment is not bound by gender. While the law remains heavily weighted toward protecting women in domestic violence or sexual harassment laws, civil injunctions and preventive criminal measures can serve as a neutral safeguard when facts demand it.
Why These Developments Matter
Every time a court passes a restraining order against a woman, it sparks debates about misuse of harassment claims, equal protection under the law, and the social hesitation men face in approaching the police. For some, this is a sign that Indian courts are becoming more gender neutral, at least in personal liberty disputes where evidence of blackmail, emotional abuse or stalking exists.
The legal takeaway is that courts don’t see an RO as a punishment but as protection. If someone, man or woman, crosses the line into unwanted intrusion, the other person has every right to knock at the court’s door.
Closing Thoughts
Restraining orders may look simple but they balance sensitive rights: liberty, privacy, freedom of movement and speech. As social awareness grows, more men too are testing these legal waters when they find themselves cornered by threats, blackmail or obsessive conduct. Whether the trend will lead to a broader policy shift, perhaps even a gender neutral domestic violence law, is for lawmakers to decide. For now, what’s clear is that Indian courts won’t shy away from using existing tools to protect whoever needs protection, no matter who stands on the other side of the court.
Contributed By: Saksham Tongar (intern)