Criminal proceedings for cheating cannot continue where allegations disclose only a civil property dispute.

The complainant alleged that he had purchased land from late Bala Prasad Dalan in 1963, with a ten-feet-wide passage shown as a common passage.

According to the complaint, the petitioners subsequently asserted ownership over the passage and executed a registered sale deed dated 28 November 2012 in favour of a third party, allegedly amounting to cheating under Section 417 IPC.

The complainant had also instituted Title Suit No. 261 of 2013 concerning the same property and alleged right over the passage; the suit was subsequently dismissed on 3 February 2021.

Nevertheless, the Magistrate took cognizance of the offence under Section 417 IPC on 19 March 2016 after conducting an enquiry and examining witnesses.

The petitioners sought quashing of the complaint proceeding and the cognizance order.

Whether the allegations in the complaint disclosed the essential ingredients of cheating under Section 417 IPC, particularly deception or dishonest inducement by the petitioners?

Whether the criminal proceeding was liable to be quashed where the underlying dispute essentially concerned title, possession, and the asserted right over a common passage, which were matters of civil adjudication?

Whether continuation of the criminal proceeding would amount to an abuse of the process of the court?

The Court applied Section 417 IPC, which penalises cheating, read with the requirement that the allegations must disclose the foundational elements of cheating, including deception or dishonest inducement.

It held that the mere existence of a civil dispute does not automatically justify quashing criminal proceedings if the complaint independently discloses a criminal offence; however, criminal law cannot be used to give a criminal colour to a dispute that is essentially civil in nature.

The Court relied on Rikhab Birani v. State of Uttar Pradesh, 2025 SCC OnLine SC 823, reiterating that criminal proceedings should not be permitted to continue where the necessary ingredients of the alleged offence are absent and the process is being used to convert a civil dispute into a criminal case.

Proceedings may therefore be quashed to prevent abuse of the process of court.

The Court found that the complaint principally concerned the parties’ competing claims regarding the common passage, title to the property, and the legal effect of the subsequent sale deed—issues already forming the subject matter of a civil suit.

Although the pendency or outcome of civil litigation, by itself, would not bar criminal proceedings, the complaint did not contain any specific allegation showing that the petitioners had practised deception or dishonestly induced the complainant, as required to constitute cheating under Section 417 IPC.

The alleged wrongful assertion of ownership and execution of the sale deed were, in the circumstances, matters for civil adjudication rather than evidence of the requisite criminal intent.

Applying the principle in Rikhab Birani, the Court concluded that the complaint attempted to give a criminal colour to an essentially civil dispute and that continuation of the proceeding, absent the basic ingredients of the offence, would constitute an abuse of process.

It held that the complaint did not disclose the essential ingredients of cheating under Section 417 IPC and that the dispute was essentially civil in nature.

Accordingly, the cognizance order dated 19 March 2016 passed by the A.C.J.M.-IX, Bhagalpur, in Complaint Case No. 2369 of 2014, together with all consequential proceedings against the petitioners, was quashed and set aside.

The application was allowed, and the judgment was directed to be communicated to the trial court.