Punjab-Haryana High Court
Parveen Kumar And Ors vs State Of Punjab on 7 November, 2012
Crl. Misc. No.M-4421 of 2010
1
IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA
AT CHANDIGARH
Crl. Misc. No.M- 4421 of 2010
Date of decision : 07.11.2012
Parveen Kumar and ors. ......Petitioners
versus
State of Punjab ...Respondent
CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE VIJENDER SINGH MALIK
1. Whether Reporters of Local Newspapers may be
allowed to see the judgment?
2. To be referred to the Reporters or not?
3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the
Digest?
Present: Mr. A.P.S. Deol, Sr. Advocate with
Mr. Devinder Bir Singh, Advocate
for the petitioners.
Mr. Amit Chaudhary, DAG, Punjab
for the respondent-State.
Mr. C.M. Munjal, Advocate
for the complainant.
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VIJENDER SINGH MALIK , J.
Parveen Kumar, Anil Kumar and Rahul Gupta, the petitioners have brought this petition under the provisions of section 482 Cr.P.C. challenging the order dated 09.02.2008 (Annexure P-3) passed by learned Judicial Magistrate Ist Class, Ludhiana as well as the judgment dated 09.05.2009 (Annexure P-4) passed by learned Additional Sessions Judge (Fast Track Court), Ludhiana.
Crl. Misc. No.M-4421 of 2010 2 As submitted by learned senior counsel for the petitioners, on the allegation that the petitioners had executed an agreement of sale in respect of certain piece of land in favour of Parminder Singh,complainant, the latter filed suit for permanent injunction on the basis of photocopy of the agreement of sale. According to him, he did not place on record the original agreement of sale. He has further submitted that alleging theft of the original agreement of sale by the petitioners, Parminder Singh has lodged FIR No. 231 dated 03.10.2007 at Police Station Model Town Ludhiana, for an offence punishable under sections 201, 380 and 420 IPC. According to him, the civil court had found the agreement to be forged and on the basis of said finding, the application for ad-interim injunction filed by Parminder Singh in the aforesaid suit was dismissed vide order dated 24.05.2010 (Annexure P/12). According to him, the appeal preferred by Parminder Singh against the aforesaid order was also dismissed.
Learned senior counsel for the petitioners has further submitted that the suit having been filed without the original agreement, the petitioners had asked him to produce the original and on being asked to produce the original, he came with the plea that the original agreement has been stolen. He has further submitted that the Crl. Misc. No.M-4421 of 2010 3 cancellation report had been submitted in the case by the police and was submitted before the court of learned Judicial Magistrate Ist Class, Ludhiana, who vide order dated 09.02.2008 (Annexure P-3) took cognizance of the offence. He has further submitted that the court was not competent to take cognizance of the offence in these circumstances because the very agreement on the basis of which the FIR has been lodged is found to be forged one.
Learned State counsel assisted by learned counsel for the complainant has submitted that the police had filed a challan in this case and after a few days, application was made to the court to return the challan claiming that the same was incomplete. According to him, it was a procedure not known to law and so the matter was taken before learned Sessions Judge, Ludhiana. He has further submitted that in the meanwhile, Deputy Superintendent of Police conducted inquiry and filed a cancellation report on which the impugned order dated 09.02.2008 has been made by learned JMIC, Ludhiana and the said order has been upheld by learned Additional Sessions Judge, Ludhiana, vide judgment dated 09.05.2009 (Annexure P-4), dismissing the revision petition filed by the petitioners.
The pure and simple question before the court is as to whether the agreement, on the basis of photocopy thereof Parminder Crl. Misc. No.M-4421 of 2010 4 Singh had filed a civil suit for permanent injunction, is a forged document or not. The order of learned Civil Judge(Jr. Divn.), Ludhiana dismissing the application for interim injunction of Parminder Singh and the order in appeal do not decide this question finally. The findings, moreover, are given on the basis of a report of a private handwriting expert, who has given the report on the basis of the basis of signatures from a photocopy of the agreement.
The mere fact that the civil suit has been filed without the original agreement, would not be sufficient to conclude that the document is forged. Most of the civil suits are filed by the parties annexing photocopies of the documents and they keep the original with them.
There is no material on the record on the basis of which it can be said that the allegations contained in the FIR regarding theft of original agreement by the petitioners, are false.
The challan in the case had already been filed and there was no procedure for return of the same. If the material given in the challan was to be supplemented in any manner that could be done by submitting a supplementary challan under section 173(8) Cr.P.C. The manner in which the challan was taken back and instead of submitting a challan with further evidence, cancellation report has been filed Crl. Misc. No.M-4421 of 2010 5 shows that there is some malafide on the part of the investigating agency. In the petition, the order dated 09.02.2008 passed by learned Judicial Magistrate Ist Class, Ludhiana is challenged for the reason that the Magistrate could not take cognizance of the offence in the absence of a protest petition. It has been mentioned in the petition that on filing of the cancellation report, the options available to the Magistrate had been either to accept the cancellation report or to direct the police to re-investigate the case and in that event to send the cancellation report of the police station or to take cognizance of the case by rejecting the cancellation report and by treating a protest petition filed by the complainant as a private complaint under section 190(1)(b) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Learned senior counsel for the petitioners has failed to make any submission in this regard. So this ground was not pressed at the time of arguments.
For the reasons given above, I find no ground to interfere with the impugned orders. The petition consequently lacks in merits and is dismissed as such November 07, 2012 (VIJENDER SINGH MALIK) dinesh JUDGE