Full Judgment Text
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PETITIONER:
MUSHTAQ AHMAD
Vs.
RESPONDENT:
MOHD. HABIBUR REHMAN FAIZI& ORS.
DATE OF JUDGMENT: 31/01/1996
BENCH:
BHARUCHA S.P. (J)
BENCH:
BHARUCHA S.P. (J)
MUKHERJEE M.K. (J)
CITATION:
1996 SCC (7) 440 JT 1996 (1) 656
1996 SCALE (1)606
ACT:
HEADNOTE:
JUDGMENT:
O R D E R
Leave granted. Heard the counsel appearing for the
parties.
The appellant herein filed a complaint before the Chief
Judicial Magistrate, Mau alleging commission of offences
under sections 406, 409, 420 and 467 IPC by the respondent
Nos. 1 to 4 (’respondents’ for short). The learned
Magistrate took cognizance upon the complaint and then
recorded the statement of the appellant under Section 200
Cr.P.C. On being satisfied from the complaint, the documents
filed therewith and the statement of the appellant that the
above offences were made out against the respondents he
issued process against them. Aggrieved thereby the
respondents filed a petition under Section 482 Cr. P.C. for
quashing the complaint and the proceeding arising therefrom
which was allowed by the High Court with a finding that the
complaint was false, frivolous and vexatious and a direction
upon the appellant to pay Rs.5,000/- to the respondents as
costs. Hence this appeal.
Having perused the impugned judgment in the light of
the complaint and its accompaniments we are constrained to
say, that the High Court exceeded its jurisdiction under
Section 482 Cr.P.C. in passing the impugned judgment and
order. It is rather unfortunate that though the High Court
referred to the decision in State of Haryana Vs. Bhajan Lal
(1992 Supp. (1) SCC 335) wherein this Court has enumerated
by way of illustration the categories of cases in which
power to quash complaint or FIR can be exercised, it did not
keep in mind - much less adhered to - the following note of
caution given therein :-
"We also give a note of caution to the
effect that the power of quashing a
criminal proceeding should be exercised
very sparingly and with circumspection
and that too in the rarest of rare
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cases; that the Court will not be
justified in embarking upon an enquiry
as to the reliability or genuineness or
otherwise of the allegations made in the
FIR or the complaint and that the
extraordinary or inherent powers do not
confer an arbitrary jurisdiction on the
Court to act according to its whim or
caprice."
In the complaint the appellant averred that he was a
teacher of Madrasa Faiz-e-Am since the year 1974 and at the
material time the respondents were the Manager, Principal,
Teacher and Member of the Managing Committee of the school
respectively. In the year 1985 he went on leave to get
higher education in Saudi Arabia and after coming back from
there in 1988 when he went to join the School he found that
his salaries and dearness allowances for the above period
had been drawn by them from the Government funds and, by
forgoing his signatures, purported payments thereof to him
were shown. According to the complaint, the respondents had
thereby committed breach of trust of Government money. In
support of the above allegations made in the complaint
copies of the salary statements of the relevant periods were
produced. Inspite of the fact that the complaint and the
documents annexed thereto clearly made out a, prima facie,
case for cheating, breach of trust and forgery, the High
Court proceeded to consider the version of the respondents
given out in their petition filed under Section 482 Cr.P.C.
vis-a-vis that of the appellant and entered into the
debatable area of deciding which of the version was true, -
a course wholly impermissible in view of the above quoted
observations in the case of Bhajan Lal (supra).
For the foregoing reason, we allow this appeal, set
aside the impugned order of the High Court and direct the
Magistrate to proceed with the complaint in accordance with
law.