"12. In the light of the above provision that defines the word dowry and takes in its ambit any kind of property or valuable security, in our opinion, the High Court fell into an error by holding that the demand of money for construction of a house cannot be treated as a dowry demand. In Appasaheb's case [supra] referred to in the impugned judgment, this Court had held that a demand for money from the parents of the deceased woman to purchase manure would not fall within the purview of "dowry", thereby strictly interpreting the definition of dowry. This view has, however, not been subscribed to in Rajinder Singh's case [supra] wherein it has been held that the said decision as also the one in the case of Vipin Jaiswal[a-1] v. State of Andhra Pradesh represented by Public Prosecutor, do not state the law correctly. Noting that the aforesaid decisions were distinct from four other decisions of this Court, viz., Bachni Devi and Another v. State of Haryana, Kulwant Singh and Others v. State of Punjab, Surinder Singh v. State of Haryana, and Reminder Singh v. State of Punjab, the Court opined that keeping in mind the fact that Section 304-Bwas inserted in the IPC to combat the social evil of dowry demand that has reached alarming 10 (2013) 3 SCC 684 11 (2011) 4 SCC 427 12 (2013) 4 SCC 177 13 (2014) 4 SCC 129 14 (2014) 12 SCC 582 proportions, it cannot be argued that in case of an ambiguity in the language used in the provision, the same ought to be construed strictly as that would amount to defeating the very object of the provision. In other words, the Court leaned in favour of assigning an expansive meaning to the expression "dowry" and held thus
