Court No. - 49
Case :- APPLICATION U/S 482 No. - 9207 of 2021
Applicant :- Vikesh Kumar Singh Sonu Opposite Party :- State of U.P. and Another Counsel for Applicant :- Santosh Kumar Singh Counsel for Opposite Party :- G.A.
Hon'ble Vivek Agarwal,J.
1. Sri Santosh Kumar Singh, learned counsel for the applicant and Sri Janardan Prakash, learned AGA for the State.
2. This application U/S 482 Cr.P.C. has been filed seeking quashing of the Charge Sheet No.01 dated 08.02.2020 filed in Case Crime No.0006 of 2019 (State vs. Vikesh Kumar Singh Sonu & Others), under Sections 419, 420, 467, 468, 471 IPC, Police Station Kotwali, District Ballia as well as all the further proceedings in Criminal Case No.3544 of 2020 pending in the court of C.J.M., Ballia.
3. Learned counsel for the applicant submits that there are omnibus allegations against the accused-persons. Secondly, name of his father is recorded as a bhumidhar and in support of that he has drawn attention to annexure no.2 to the application, which is a document pertaining to Khata No.00800 so to impress this Court that applicant has inherited this land from his father Sri Padumdev Singh and, therefore, he was entitled to alienate the property in favour of third party. Thereafter, reliance has been placed on document, annexure no.8, allegedly a communication issued from the Office of Tehsildar, Ballia on 04.02.2020 in reference to some letter dated 25.01.2020 without there being any dispatch number, endorsement to whom it is addressed and also making a reference of the concerned authority in relation to whose letter dated 25.01.2020, said communication has been noted.
4. It is submitted that it is mentioned in the letter that there was a clerical error and there was no mens rea on the part of Lekhpal and, therefore, no loss has been caused to any of the parties.
5. Placing reliance on these documents, it is submitted that it is a fit case for quashing the charge sheet and consequential proceedings.
6. Sri Janardan Prakash, learned AGA, in his turn, submits that earlier applicant had filed Criminal Misc. Writ Petition No.4691 of 2019 seeking quashing of the FIR, which was dismissed by a Division Bench of this Court making following observations:-
"From the perusal of the FIR, prima facie offence is made out against the petitioner at this stage therefore, we do not find any justifiable ground to quash the impugned first information report, hence the prayer for quashing the first information report is refused."
7. It is further submitted that in annexure no.2, on which lot of emphasis is being laid by the applicant, is in relation to Khata No.00800, whereas a perusal of the FIR will reveal that complainants are owners of Khata No.665, Arazi No.70, Gram Tikhampur, District Ballia measuring 0.03 hectare and their name is recorded as Sankramaniya Bhumidhar in the Revenue records.
8. Allegation on the present applicant is that he had with a view to misappropriate the land of the complainant, in collusion with the revenue authorities, shown it to be land contained in Khata No.00716 measuring 0.0270 hectare and got his name mutated and, thereafter, sold that land on 03.03.2016 through a registered sale deed in favour of one Siya Ram Upadhyay s/o Late Shiv Dutt Upadhyay.
9. After hearing learned counsel for the parties and going through the record, it is evident that applicant has failed to show any document from record to substantiate that land contained in Khata No.665 is that of ownership of the present applicant or his father Padumdev Singh. He has also failed to bring on record that under which authority of law, he sold this land in favour of Sri Siya Ram Upadhyay.
10. Letter of Tehsildar does not inspire any confidence, inasmuch as, as has been indicated by learned AGA, neither any reference has been given nor it contains any dispatch number or any endorsement to substantiate that it is not a communication received out of turn.
11. In view of such facts and also keeping in view the law laid down by Supreme Court in case of State of Haryana and Others vs. Bhajan Lal and Others, 1992 Supplementary (1) SCC 335 and in case of International Advanced Research Centre For Powder Matallurgy and New Materials (ARCI) and others Vs. Nirma Cerglass Technic Private Limited and another, (2016) 1 SCC 348, it is held that when a prosecution at the initial stage is asked to be quashed, the test to be applied by the court is, as to whether uncontroverted allegations as made in the complaint establish the offence. The High Court being superior court of the State, should refrain from analysing the materials which are yet to be adduced and seen in their true perspective. The inherent jurisdiction of the High Court under section 482 Cr.P.C., should not be exercised to stifle a legitimate prosecution. The power under Section 482 Cr.P.C. to be used sparingly only in rare cases. It is further held by exercising inherent jurisdiction under section 482 Cr.P.C., it is not for the High Court to appreciate the evidence and its truthfulness or sufficiency inasmuch as it is the function of the trial court. Therefore, court below has not committed any error or illegality in taking cognizance in the matter and therefore culpability or otherwise will be judged as per evidence recorded before the court of law.
12. At this stage no ground is made out for quashing of either criminal case or the charge sheet or the cognizance order, in the light of the law laid down in case of Bhajan Lal (supra) and ARCI (supra), therefore, the application fails and is dismissed.
13. At this stage, learned counsel for the applicant submits that dispute is largely of civil nature and draws attention of this Court to an application under Section 38 of U.P. Revenue Code, 2006, annexure no.3, but again this document does not inspire confidence inasmuch as applicant has either deliberately or with some motive not enclosed the original copy/photocopy of the document, of which typed copy has been enclosed. There are several lapses in the filing of the application including deliberate non filing of original documents or their photocopies and in place instead filing typed copies without showing them to be true copy of the document, from which typed copy has been extracted.
Order Date :- 13.8.2021 Ravi/-