SAYAN MONDAL vs STATE OF WEST BENGAL

IN THE HIGH COURT AT CALCUTTA
CRIMINAL REVISIONAL JURISDICTION
APPELLATE SIDE

PRESENT:
THE HON’BLE JUSTICE UDAY KUMAR

CRR 2992 OF 2023

SRI SAYAN MONDAL
-VS-
THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL

For the Petitioner : Mr. Shayan Sachin Basu

For the State : Dr. Achin Jana,
Ms. Kritika Jain

Reserved on : 18.09.2026
Pronounced on : 25.09.2026

UDAY KUMAR, J.: –
1. By this criminal revisional application preferred under Section 482 read
with Sections 395/397 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, the de
facto complainant/petitioner has called in question the legality, validity,
th
and propriety of the order dated 27.06.2023 passed by the 6 Court of
the learned Additional Sessions Judge, in-charge of the 1st Court-cum-
Special Court under the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes
(Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 at Alipore, South 24-Parganas, in
Special Case No. 89 of 2022. By the said impugned order, the learned
Special Court rejected the na-raji (protest) petition filed by the

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petitioner, accepted the Final Report True, No Clue (FRT) submitted by
the police, and dropped the special proceeding.
2. The short facts leading to the present filing are that the petitioner,
belonging to the Scheduled Caste community, lodged a written
complaint on 21.09.2022 at about 9:45 PM alleging that the accused
persons—namely, Rabiul Islam Bulbul and Sayan Dutta—belonging to
the general caste, hurled foul, unparliamentary, and casteist expletives
targeting his caste identity, religion, God, and family through the social
media platform ‘Facebook’, enclosing digital screenshots thereof. The
said complaint culminated in Behala Police Station Case No. 274 dated
17.10.2022 under Section 3(1)(r)/(s) of the Scheduled Castes and the
Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, which was
subsequently renumbered as Special Case No. 89 of 2022.
3. During the course of investigation, the Investigating Officer recorded the
statement of the de facto complainant under Section 164 of the Cr.P.C.,
recorded Section 161 Cr.P.C. statements of independent witnesses, and
prepared a formal seizure list in respect of the digital links and
screenshots. However, the police submitted an FRT ("Nil/No clue") on
20.01.2023 stating that assistance sought from the Facebook authority
through the Cyber Police Station, Kolkata, yielded no actual user
particulars from Facebook. Upon receipt of notice of closure, the
petitioner filed a na-raji petition on 14.02.2023. By the impugned order
dated 27.06.2023, the learned Special Court rejected the na-raji
petition holding that since charge sheets had been filed in three other
special cases instituted by the same complainant (Spl. Case Nos.

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50/2021, 31/2022, and 9/2022), and a "Nil" charge sheet/FRT was
filed here after due investigation, no cogent reason to nullify the said
FRT and order re-investigation was made out.
4. Learned counsel appearing for the petitioner submits that the Trial
Court committed a patent error in law by treating a multiplicity of prior
or parallel complaints filed by the petitioner as a negative filter or
disqualification to evaluate a distinct atrocity complaint. It is urged that
prima facie cognizable ingredients under Section 3(1)(r)/(s) of the
SC/ST Act are writ large in the FIR, the Section 164 statement, and the
seized digital evidence. The inability of local cyber cells to extract data
from social media intermediaries cannot wash out criminal culpability
or license a perfunctory dead-end closure without invoking specialized
supervisory or cyber-forensic channels.
5. Learned counsel for the State defends the impugned order, submitting
that the investigation was duly conducted and, upon failure to trace
user ID particulars through cyber channels, a true closure report was
rightly submitted. Relying on K. Vadivel v. V. Shanthi & Ors. [(2024) 19
SCC 382] , learned counsel submits that the power under Section 173(8)
Cr.P.C. must be invoked cautiously and only in exceptional
circumstances, that an order granting further investigation cannot be
passed in the absence of relevant, newly discovered facts/material
evidence.
6. I have heard learned counsel for the respective parties and perused the
materials on record, including the impugned order, FIR, Section 164
statement, and seizure documentation.

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CRR 2992 OF 2023

7. The core question that falls for determination is whether the acceptance
of a "Nil/No clue" FRT and the rejection of the na-raji petition—resting
on the circumstance that charge sheets had been filed in other
unrelated special cases instituted by the same complainant—is legally
sustainable.
8. It is no longer res integra that upon submission of a final report, the
Magistrate or Special Judge is duty-bound to evaluate the protest/na-
raji petition independently on its merits to ascertain whether cognizable
material has been overlooked or if the investigation has been
perfunctory, as expounded by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in Bhagwant
Singh v. Commissioner of Police & Anr., [(1985) 2 SCC 537)] .
9. What shocks judicial conscience in the instant case is the reasoning
adopted by the learned Special Judge, that because the complainant
had filed three other special cases where charge sheets were submitted,
the "Nil" report in the present case must be accepted. Criminal
jurisprudence examines every distinct criminal transaction and
occurrence on its own foundational worth and evidentiary matrix. A
litigant’s resort to law in prior or parallel separate transactions can
never form a legal basis to non-suit or presume a lack of merit in a
distinct subsequent grievance of casteist insult committed via digital
media. Such reasoning is perverse and contrary to the basic tenets of
criminal adjudication.
10. Furthermore, under Section 3(1)(r)/(s) of the SC/ST Act, public view
transcends physical space into the digital domain. When electronic
screenshots and links are formally seized under a seizure list and

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corroborated by a Section 164 statement, the investigating agency
cannot throw up its hands reporting "no clue" merely because a local
cyber inquiry hit a dead end with an intermediary (Facebook/Meta),
without exhausting specialized State CID cyber-forensic or IP-log
tracking protocols. The failure of the trial court to direct further
investigation through a higher supervisory rank (such as the Deputy
Commissioner of Police tier or a specialized cyber cell) in the face of
such digital material causes a serious miscarriage of justice, as held by
the Hon’ble Supreme Court in Vinay Tyagi v. Irshad Ali alias Deepak &
Ors., [(2013) 5 SCC 762] .
11. The decision of K. Vadivel (supra) relied on by the opposite party, being
factually distinguishable, is not apposite to decide the present
revisional application.
12. Concluding the discussion made above, this Court answers the
question for determination in negative, in favour of the petitioner. The
impugned order dated 27.06.2023 passed in Special Case No. 89 of
th
2022 by the 6 Court of the learned Additional Sessions Judge, in-
charge of the 1st Court-cum-Special Court at Alipore, South 24-
Parganas, cannot be sustained in law.
13. Accordingly, the impugned order dated 27.06.2023 is set aside.
14. The acceptance of the FRT and the dropping of Special Case No. 89 of
2022 are hereby quashed.
15. The matter is remanded to the Special Court, Alipore, with a direction
that further investigation into Behala Police Station Case No. 274 dated
17.10.2022 shall be conducted under the direct supervision of the

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Deputy Commissioner of Police (South-West Division / Specialized
Cyber Cell supervisory tier, Kolkata Police). The supervisory authority
shall deploy specialized cyber-forensic personnel to trace the digital
footprints and profile logs of the offending posts and submit a police
report under Section 173(8) of the Cr.P.C. before the jurisdictional
Special Court within three months from the date of communication of
this order.
16. The Special Court shall thereafter proceed in accordance with law.
17. C.R.R. 2992 of 2023 is, accordingly, allowed.
18. Connected application(s), if pending, stand disposed of.
19. Interim order(s), if any, stands vacated.
20. There shall be no order as to costs.
21. Let a copy of this judgment be transmitted to the Learned Trial Court
forthwith along with the Trial Court Records.
22. Urgent photostat certified copy of this judgment, if applied for, be
supplied to the parties upon compliance with all requisite formalities.

(Uday Kumar, J.)