Court No. - 48
Case :- APPLICATION U/S 482 No. - 6423 of 2018
Applicant :- Santosh Singh And 6 Others Opposite Party :- State Of U.P. And Another Counsel for Applicant :- Ranvijay Chaubey Counsel for Opposite Party :- G.A.
Hon'ble Karuna Nand Bajpayee,J.
This application under Section 482 Cr.P.C. has been filed seeking the quashing of summoning order dated 13.10.2017 passed by Judicial Magistrate, Court no.21, District-Azamgarh as well as entire proceeding in Complaint Case No.624 of 2017 (Harihar Singh vs. Ram Bahal and others), under Sections-323, 325, 504, 506 I.P.C., P.S.-Kaptanganj, District-Azamarh, pending in the court of Judicial Magistrate, court No.21, District-Azamgarh.
Heard applicants' counsel and learned AGA. Entire record has been perused.
Submission of counsel for the applicants is that this is a counterblast case. Initially a case u/s 308 I.P.C. was registered and opposite party no.2 wants to take illegal possession of the applicants' land and therefore this malicious case has been filed. It has also been submitted that earlier also an application u/s 156(3) Cr.P.C. was given and there is an imbelishment in the version which is not permissible and for all these reasons the impugned proceedings should be quashed.
The law regarding sufficiency of material which may justify the summoning of accused and also the court's decision to proceed against him in a given case is well settled. The court has to eschew itself from embarking upon a roving enquiry into the last details of the case. It is also not advisable to adjudge whether the case shall ultimately end in conviction or not. Only a prima facie satisfaction of the court about the existence of sufficient ground to proceed in the matter is required.
Through a catena of decisions given by Hon'ble Apex Court this legal aspect has been expatiated upon at length and the law that has evolved over a period of several decades is too well settled. The cases of (1) Chandra Deo Singh Vs. Prokash Chandra Bose AIR 1963 SC 1430 , (2) Vadilal Panchal Vs. Dattatraya Dulaji Ghadigaonker AIR 1960 SC 1113 and (3) Smt. Nagawwa Vs. Veeranna Shivalingappa Konjalgi 1976 3 SCC 736 may be usefully referred to in this regard.
The Apex Court decisions given in the case of R.P. Kapur Vs. State of Punjab AIR 1960 SC 866 and in the case of State of Haryana Vs. Bhajan Lal 1992 SCC(Cr.) 426 have also recognized certain categories by way of illustration which may justify the quashing of a complaint or charge sheet. Some of them are akin to the illustrative examples given in the above referred case of Smt. Nagawwa Vs. Veeranna Shivalingappa Konjalgi 1976 3 SCC 736. The cases where the allegations made against the accused or the evidence collected by the Investigating Officer do not constitute any offence or where the allegations are absurd or extremely
improbable impossible to believe or where prosecution is legally barred or where criminal proceeding is malicious and malafide instituted with ulterior motive of grudge and vengeance alone may be the fit cases for the High Court in which the criminal proceedings may be quashed. Hon'ble Apex Court in Bhajan Lal's case has recognized certain categories in which Section-482 of Cr.P.C. or Article-226 of the Constitution may be successfully invoked.
Illumined by the case law referred to herein above, this Court has adverted to the entire record of the case.
Perusal of complaint would reveal that the complainant Harihar Singh made allegations that on account of animosity regarding land in dispute, some altercation had taken place on 3.5.2016 in the morning and in respect of said altercation, the accused persons i.e. all seven applicants came to his house at about 4.00 O'clock in the evening on 3.5.2016, when the complainant and his wife were sitting at their doorstep and assaulted upon the complainant and his wife by lathi-danda and also hurled filthy abuses, whereupon they tried to escape in the house but the accused persons entered into the house and caused injuries and also damaged the household goods and also took away certain domestic things. It is also alleged that upon hue and cry of the complainant side, several persons reached at the spot and witnessed the incident and when some of those persons tried to restrain the accused persons from taking away the household goods of the complainant, they were also assaulted by the accused persons and were threatened to face dire consequences. It is also alleged that the assault of accused side caused fracture to the wife of complainant and when she was taken to the Government Hospital, Ranipur, (Koyalsa), she after medical examination was referred to District Hospital, Azamgarh for x-ray after having an opinion about seriousness of the injuries. Further allegation is that the complainant had given information of the incident to the police station on the next day but his report was not lodged, whereupon the information was also sent to the concerned Superintendent of Police through registered post but no First Information Report was lodged. It is also disclosed in the complaint that a cross case of the said incident was lodged at the instance of the accused side being Case Crime No.77 of 2016, u/s 147, 149, 452, 323, 504, 506, 308 I.P.C.
Counsel for the applicants could not dispute either the injuries received by complainant side or their nature. So far as the imbelishment in the version is concerned, the matter relates to appreciation of evidence and it cannot be said that it should be a ground to quash the complaint.
All other submissions made by the applicants' counsel call for adjudication on pure questions of fact which may be adequately adjudicated upon only by the trial court and while doing so even the submissions made on points of law can also be more appropriately gone into by the trial court in this case. This Court does not deem it proper, and therefore cannot be persuaded to have a pre-trial before the actual trial begins. A threadbare discussion of various facts and circumstances, as they emerge from the allegations made against the accused, is being purposely avoided by the Court for the reason, lest the same might cause any prejudice to either side during trial. But it shall suffice to observe that the perusal of the complaint, and also the material available on record make out a prima facie case against the accused at this stage and there appear to be sufficient ground for proceeding against the accused. I do not find any justification to quash the complaint or the summoning order or the proceedings against the applicant arising out of them as the case does not fall in any of the categories recognized by the Apex Court which may justify their quashing.
The prayer for quashing the same is refused as I do not see any abuse of the Court's process either.
The application being devoid of merit stands dismissed.
Order Date :- 26.2.2018
M. Kumar