Court No. - 1
Case :- CRIMINAL MISC. WRIT PETITION No. - 22743 of 2018
Petitioner :- Babu Irphan
Respondent :- State Of U.P. And 2 Others
Counsel for Petitioner :- Ashok Kumar Singh Bais
Counsel for Respondent :- G.A.
Hon'ble Ramesh Sinha,J. Hon'ble Dinesh Kumar Singh-I,J.
Heard Ms. Shachi Srivastava holding brief of Sri A.K.S. Bais, learned counsel for the petitioner, Sri N.K. Verma, learned A.G.A. appearing for the State and perused the impugned F.I.R. as well as material brought on record.
The relief sought in this petition is for quashing of the F.I.R. dated 20.5.2018, registered as case crime No.274 of 2018, under Sections 376- D, 506 I.P.C. and 7/8 POCSO Act, P.S. Gangoh, District Saharanpur.
Learned counsel for the petitioners submits that the petitioner along with four other accused persons have have been named in the FIR and they belong to the family of respondent no.3. She further submits that the dispute between the parties, if any, is purely civil in nature . She next argued that the co-accused, namely, Tahir has already approached this Court challenging the impugned FIR by means of filing Crl. Misc. Writ Petition No.19964 of 2018 in which interim protection was granted to him by this Court vide order dated 26.7.2018, copy of which has been annexed as Annexure-4 to the writ petition, hence, interim protection may also be granted to the petitioner. The allegations levelled against the petitioner is absolutely false, frivolous and baseless. No offence is made out against the petitioner.
Learned A.G.A. opposed the prayer for quashing of the F.I.R. which discloses cognizable offence and submitted that the co-accused, namely, Tahir who was granted interim protection was not named in the FIR and his case was distinguished by this Court while granting interim protection to him on 26.72018.
The Full Bench of this court in Ajit Singh @ Muraha v. State of U.P. and others (2006 (56) ACC 433) reiterated the view taken by the earlier Full Bench in Satya Pal v. State of U.P. and others (2000 Cr.L.J. 569) that there can be no interference with the investigation or order staying arrest unless cognizable offence is not ex-facie discernible from the allegations contained in the F.I.R. or there is any statutory restriction operating on the power of the Police to investigate a case as laid down by the Apex Court in various decisions including State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal and others (AIR 1992 SC 604) attended with further elaboration that observations and directions contained in Joginder Kumar's case (Joginder Kumar v. State of U.P. and others (1994) 4 SCC 260 contradict extension to the power of the High Court to stay arrest or to quash an F.I.R. under article 226 and the same are intended to be observed in compliance by the Police, the breach whereof, it has been further elaborated, may entail action by way of departmental proceeding or action under the contempt of Court Act. The Full Bench has further held that it is not permissible to appropriate the writ jurisdiction under Article 226 of the constitution as an alternative to anticipatory bail which is not invocable in the State of U.P. attended with further observation that what is not permissible to do directly cannot be done indirectly.
The learned counsel for the petitioner has not brought forth anything cogent or convincing to manifest that no cognizable offence is disclosed prima facie on the allegations contained in the F.I.R. or that there was any statutory restriction operating on the police to investigate the case.
Having scanned the allegations contained in the F.I.R. the Court is of the view that the allegations in the F.I.R. do disclose commission of cognizable offence and/therefore no ground is made out warranting interference by this Court. The prayer for quashing the same is refused.
The petition lacks merit and is accordingly, dismissed.
(Dinesh Kumar Singh-I, J.) (Ramesh Sinha, J.)
Order Date :- 21.8.2018 NS