JUDGMENT G.P. Mathur, J.
1. This matter has come before us on a reference made by a learned Single Judge as he doubted the correctness of a decision rendered by Hon'ble M. Katju, J. in Rama Shankar Pandey v. U.P. Police Station Officer, Kotwali, Ghazipur, 1994 ACC 346.
2. The present application has been filed under Section 482, Cr. P. C. for quashing the F.I.R. lodged on 27-8-1992 under Sections 406 and 420, I.P.C. at P.S. Kotwali District Kanpur Nagar, on the basis of which Case Crime No. 609 of 1992 has been registered. A further prayer has been made that the police authorities be restrained from arresting the applicant.
3. The petition under Section 482, Cr. P. C. has been filed soon after the F.I.R. was lodged and during the pendency of the investigation of the case. A Full Bench of seven Judges in Ram Lal Yadav v. State of U.P., 1989 Cri LJ 1013 has held that the High Court has no inherent power under Section 482, Cr. P. C. to interfere with the investigation done by the police. It was further held that the High Court has no inherent power under Section 482, Cr. P. C. to say the arrest of an accused during the investigation of the case. However, a learned Single Judge in Rama Shankar Pandey v. U.P. Police Station Officer, Kotwali, Ghazipur, 1994 ACC 346, placing reliance upon State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal, AIR 1992 SC 604 and State of Andhra Pradesh v. P.V. Pavithran, AIR 1990 SC 1266 : (1990 Cri LJ 1306) held that the Full Bench decision in Ram Lal Yadav is no longer good law. He further held that the High Court, in exceptional circumstances, has power under Section 482, Cr. P. C. to quash the F.I.R. and the investigation commenced thereto and also to stay the arrest of the accused. The learned Single Judge who heard the present petition was of the opinion that the view taken in Rama Shankar Pandey (supra) was not correct and accordingly made the following reference to a larger bench:
"Whether the Full Bench decision of this Court in the case of Ram Lal Yadav v. State of U.P. (supra), in spite of this Court's aforesaid decision in the case of Rama Shanker Pandey v. U.P. Police Station Officer, Kotwali, Ghazipur, (supra) continues to be good law."
4. Two questions were referred to a Full Bench in Prashant Gaur v. State of U.P., 1988 AWC 828 viz., (1) Whether under Section 482, Cr. P. C., the High Court has inherent powers to interfere with the investigation by the police, (2) Whether the High Court has powers to stay the arrest during investigation. The Full Bench answered the questions as under :
"1. Investigation into an offence is a statutory function of the police and the superintendence thereof is vested in the State Government. It is only in the rarest of rare cases, and that too, when it is found by the Court that the FIR and the investigation over a reasonable length of time, do not disclose the commission of a cognizable offence, or any offence of any kind, that the High Court may, under Section 482 of the Code, interfere with the investigation.
2. Under Section 482 of the Code, the High Court, may not direct the stay of arrest during investigation except for a limited period in case of such exceptional nature as is referred in the preceding paragraphs."
5. A learned Single Judge was however of the opinion that the view taken in Prashant Gaur (supra) was not correct and accordingly referred the following questions for consideration by a larger bench:
" 1. Are the answers to the questions Nos. 1 and 2 given by the Full Bench and the reasons for recording those answers, in accord with the law laid down by the Hon'ble Supreme Court and the Privy Council?
2. If the answer to the above question is not in the affirmative, then what is the correct answer to the questions posed before the Full Bench?
3. If no answer is thought necessary for any reason to the question No. 2, above, then correct legal position with reference to Puttan Singh's, case may be laid down?"
6. It was in these circumstances that a Full Bench of seven Judges was constituted in Ram Lal Yadav v. State of U.P., 1989 Cri LJ 1013, which examined the correctness of the Full Bench decision rendered in Prashant Gaur v. State of U.P. (supra).
In Emperor v. Khwaja Nazif Ahmed, AIR 1945 PC 18, it was held that it is of the utmost importance that the judiciary should not interfere with the police in matters which are within their providence and into which the law imposed upon them the duty of inquiry. There is a statutory right on the part of the police to investigate the circumstances of alleged cognizable crime without requiring any authority from the judicial authorities and it would be an unfortunate result if it should be held possible to interfere with these statutory rights by an exercise of the inherent jurisdiction of the Court. It was further held that the functions of the judiciary and the police are complementary not overlapping and the combination of individual liberty with a due observance of law and order is only to be obtained by leaving each to exercise its own functions. The Court's function begin when a charge is preferred before it and not until then. Their Lordships went on to observe that it had sometimes been thought that Section 561-A has given increased powers to the Court which it did not possess before that section was enacted. But that is not so. The section gives no new powers, it only provides that those which the Courts already inherently possesses shall be preserved and is inserted lest it should be considered that the only powers possessed by the Court are those expressly conferred by the Criminal Procedure Code and that no inherent power has survived the passing of the Act.
7. In State of West Bengal v. S.N. Basak, AIR 1963 SC 447 : (1963 (1) Cri LJ 341) the Apex, Court approved the decision of Privy Council in Emperor v. Khwaja Nazir Ahmad supra and held as under :
"........ .The powers of investigation into cognizable offences are contained in Chapter XIV of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Section 154 which is in that Chapter deals with information in cognizable offences and Section 156 with investigation into such offences and under these sections the police has the statutory right to investigate into the circumstances of any alleged cognizable offence without authority from a Magistrate and this statutory power of the police to investigate cannot be interfered with by the exercise of power under Section 439 or under the inherent power of the Court under Section 561-A of the Criminal Procedure Code."
8. Again in S. N. Sharma v. Bipen Kumar Tewari, AIR 1970 SC 786 : (1970 Cri LJ 764) the Court after taking notice of Khwaja Nazir Ahmad (supra) held as under :
"This interpretation, to some extent, supports the view that the scheme of the Criminal Procedure Code is that the power of the police to investigate a cognizable offence is not to be interfered with by the Judiciary."
9. After referring to the above quoted decisions and also to Hazari Lal Gupta v. Rameshwar, AIR 1972 SC 484 : (1972 Cri LJ 298), Jehan Singh v. Delhi Administration, AIR 1974 SC 1146 : (1974 Cri LJ 802), Kurukshetra University v. State of Haryana, AIR 1977 SC 2229 : (1977 Cri LJ 1900), State of Bihar v. J.A.C. Saldahna, AIR 1980 SC 326 : (1980 Cri LJ 98) and State of West Bengal v. Sampat Lal, AIR 1985 SC 195 : (1985 Cri LJ 516) wherein, it was reiterated that investigation is a matter for police under the scheme of the Code and interference by the Court into police investigation is not to be approved, the Full Bench held as under :
"We are, however, clearly of the opinion that power of the High Court under Section 482, Cr. P. C. to quash an F.I.R. or a complaint referred to above is with reference to proceedings in Court after the filing of a charge-sheet or a complaint and not to investigation prior to the filing of the charge-sheet in Court."
10. The answer given by the Full Bench to the question referred to it was as under :
"In our opinion the High Court has no inherent power under Section 482, Cr. P. C. to interfere with the arrest of a person by a police officer even in violation of Section 41(1)(a), Cr. P. C. either when no offence is disclosed in the first information report or when the investigation is mala fide as the inherent powers of the Court to prevent the abuse of the process of the Court or to otherwise secure the ends of justice come into play only after the charge-sheet has been filed in Court and not during investigation which may even be illegal and unauthorised. If the High Court is convinced that the power of arrest by a police officer will be exercised wrongly or mala fide in violation of Section 41(1)(a), Cr. P. C. the High Court can always issue a writ of mandamus under Article 226 of the Constitution restraining the police officer from misusing his legal power."
11. For holding that the aforesaid decision is no longer good law in Rama Shankar Pandey v. U.P. Police Station Officer, Kotwali, Ghazipur (supra), the learned Single Judge has placed reliance on two decisions of the Supreme Court. In State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal (supra), the Court exhaustively dealt with all the earlier decisions and thereafter summarised and laid down the category of cases in para 108 of the reports where the Court could exercise its extraordinary powers under Article 226 or the inherent powers under Section 482, Cr. P. C. No doubt there is reference to Section 482, Cr. P. C. in para 108 but it is noteworthy that in this case the proceedings in the High Court had commenced on a writ petition which was filed by Bhajan Lal under Article 226 of the Constitution seeking issuance of a writ of certiorari for quashing the first information report and also of a writ of prohibition restraining the appellants from further proceeding with the investigation. (See para 20 of the reports). The High Court had allowed the writ petition filed by Bhajan Lal and feeling aggrieved by the said decision the State of Haryana had preferred the appeal before the Supreme Court. In State of Andhra Pradesh v. P.V. Pavithran (supra), a F.I.R. was lodged under Section 5(2) read with Section 5(1)(e) of Prevention of Corruption Act. The Anti Corruption Bureau after completing investigation submitted its report to the Director General who in turn sent the same to the Government for granting sanction. The Government accorded the sanction for prosecution of the accused. It was thereafter that the accused filed the petition for quashing of the further proceedings, which was allowed by the High Court. The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal on the ground that the accused had been allowed to retire from service after attaining the age of superannuation and, therefore, it was not a fit case for interference.
12. In Janta Dal v. H.S. Chowdhary, AIR 1993 SC 892, (Bofors Case) the High Court exercising powers under Sections 397 and 401 read with Section 482, Cr. P. C. during the investigation stage issued notice to the C.B.I. and State to show cause why the proceedings initiated on the basis of the F.I.R. be not quashed. The Apex Court after examining the matter in considerable detail set aside the order of the High Court and paras 154 and 155 of the reports read as under :
"154. Sawant, J. in his submission note in Kekoo J. Maneckji v. Union of India, 1980 Cri LJ 258 (Bom) has expressed his opinion thus (para 21):
"This is admittedly a stage where the prosecuting agency is still investigating the offences and collecting evidence against the accused. The petitioner, who is the accused, has therefore, no locus standi at this stage to question the manner in which the evidence should be collected. The law of this country does not give any right to the accused to control, or interfere with, the collection of evidence."
155. The Seven-Judges Full Bench of the Allahabad High Court went into the matter very exhaustively in Ram Lal Yadav v. State of U.P., 1989 Cri LJ 1013 and held that "the power of the police to investigate into a report which discloses the commission of a cognizable offence is unfettered and cannot be interfered with by the High Court in exercise of its inherent powers under Section 482, Cr. P. C." This decision has overruled two earlier decisions of that Court in Prashant Gaur v. State of U.P., 1988 All WC 828 (FB) and Puttan Singh v. State of U.P., 1987 All LJ 599."
13. In para 156, the Court referred to the decision in Bhajan Lal's case. It is important to note that this case was decided by the same Bench which heard and decided State of Haryana v. Chowdhary Bhajan Lal (supra). The fact that the Court referred with approval to the decision of Ram Lal Yadav v. State of U.P., is ample proof of the fact that the decision in Bhajan Lal has not in any way diluted or affected the ratio of Ram Lal Yadav v. State of U.P. (supra).
14. It may be noticed that in none of the two decisions relied upon by the learned Single Judge in Rama Shankar Pandey v. U.P. Police Station Officer, Kotwali, Ghazipur (supra), the Supreme Court had gone into the question whether the inherent powers of the Court under Section 482, Cr. P. C. can be exercised during the investigation of the case. This precise question which was examined by the Full Bench in Ram Lal Yadav supra, has in fact not at all been touched in either of the Supreme Court decisions. In Good Year India Ltd. v. State of Haryana, AIR 1990 SC 781, it has been held that it is well-settled that a precedent is an authority only for what it actually decides and not for what may remotely or even logically follow from it. A decision is an authority for what it actually decides. What is of the essence in a decision is its ratio and not every observation found therein nor what logically flows from the various observations made in it. See Quinn v. Leathers, 1901 AC 495, Orient Paper and Industries Ltd. v. State of Orissa, AIR 1991 SC 672 and Krishna Kumar v. Union of India, AIR 1990 SC 1782 : (1990 Lab IC 1490). Therefore, it is not possible to hold that the Supreme Court has ruled as a principle of law that the High Court can interfere under Section 482, Cr. P. C. during the investigation of the case.
15. In our opinion, there is no such observation in State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal supra and State of Andhra Pradesh v. P. V. Pavithran supra that the High Court can interfere under Section 482, Cr. P. C. during the stage of investigation and the view to the contrary taken by the learned Single Judge is not correct and is hereby overruled.
16. Our answer to the question referred is :
"The Full Bench decision in Ram Lal Yadav v. State of U.P., 1989 Cri LJ 1013, continues to be good law and still holds the field. The view taken in Rama Shankar Pandey v. U.P. Police Station, Kotwali, Ghazipur, 1994 ACC 346, does not lay down the correct law."
17. The aforesaid decision is hereby overruled.