Delhi District Court
Keshav Bansal vs State on 3 January, 2026
IN THE COURT OF SHRI VIPIN KHARB
ADDITIONAL SESSIONS JUDGE-07 : SOUTH-EAST DISTRICT
SAKET COURTS : NEW DELHI
Crl. Revision No.: 432/2023
Keshav Bansal Vs. State & Anr.
ORDER
03.01.2026
1. Present criminal revision petition u/s 397/399 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (Cr.P.C) has been filed by the revisionist against the impugned order dated 23.02.2023 passed by the court of Ms. Shivani Chauhan, Ld. CMM, South East, Saket Courts, Delhi in case bearing Cr. Case No.3969/2021 arising out of closure report in FIR no.78/2017 PS EOW, titled as "State Vs. Final Report", whereby the Ld. CMM has been pleased to issue summons against the revisionist for the offence u/s 420/120B IPC in complaint case.
2. By filing the present revision petition, revisionist seeks to set aside and quash the impugned dismissal order dated 23.02.2023 passed by the Ld. Trial Court.
3. Brief facts of the case are that an agreement to sell was executed between the complainant and Intex Technologies India Private Ltd. (herein after referred to as ITIPL) on 28.09.2016 with respect to property situated at 205, Sector-63, Noida for a total consideration of Rs.8 crores. As per agreement to Sell, the transaction was to be completed within 45 Page 1 of 9 days expendable by 30 days. The property was offered to the respondent no.2 for a sum of Rs.9.20 crores. Respondent no.2 handed over a sum of Rs.1 crore to revisionist. Thereafter, agreement dated 28.09.2016, was executed between respondent no.2 and Karambir, authorised signatory of M/s. Intex Technologies (India) of which revisionist is one of the Director, for sale of property for total sale consideration of Rs.8 crores. Subsequently, respondent no.2 made payment of Rs.3.70 crores on different dates to revisionist. On the insistence of revisionist, respondent no.2 transferred a sum of Rs.2.50 crores from the account of his son namely Imran Ahmed on 06.02.2017. Another sum of Rs.1 crore on 08.02.2017 through RTGS. On 09.02.2017, revisionist returned Rs.2.5 crores through RTGS to respondent no.2 and got changed the name of vendee and transferred the property in the name of Imran Ahmed, son of respondent no.2. Subsequently, respondent no.2 came to know that several loans against the property have been taken from State Bank of India, Central Bank of India, HDFC, Kotak Mahindra Bank and Axis Bank. It is the contention of respondent no.2 that had he known that the property is mortgaged with various banks, he would not have entered in the agreement to sell with revisionist and thus, revisionist have cheated the respondent no.2. The factum of mortgage had been suppressed from the complainant and he was induced to pay money misrepresenting that the property was free from all encumbrances. The same is also stipulated in the paragraph no.1 & 8 of agreement to sell. Revisionist was the Director of the company during the relevant period.
4. On 01.02.2017, respondent no.2 filed a complaint before SHO PS Okhla against revisionist herein, Mr. Muneesh Kher and Mr. Sunil Chopra, u/s 420/468/467/471/406/506/34 IPC on the ground that they Page 2 of 9 tried to sell the above property to him without disclosing the said property was mortgaged with consortium of banks but no action was taken by SHO. On 15.02.2017, respondent no.2 filed a complaint u/s 200 Cr.PC and an application u/s 156(3) Cr.PC before Ld. MM-02, SE Saket Courts and on 08.03.2017, the application u/s 156(3) Cr.PC of respondent no.2 was dismissed by Ld. MM-02, SE, Saket Courts. Respondent no.2 filed a Crl. Revision Petition No.143/17 against the order dated 08.03.2017 by which application u/s 156(3) Cr.P.C was dismissed and it was allowed by order dated 01.05.2017 and matter was remanded back to the Ld. Trial Court for consideration and direction was given for registration of an FIR. Ld. Trial Court in compliance, on 08.05.2017 passed an order directing PS EOW to register an FIR and on 09.05.2017, FIR No.78/17, PS EOW u/s 420/34 was registered against the revisionist.
5. The order dated 01.05.2017 passed by Ld. Revision Court was challenged before Hon'ble High Court in Crl. M.C No.24269/2017, Crl. M.As 9834-9835/2017 & Crl. M.A 1234/2018, Crl. M.C. No.2430/2017 and Crl. M.As 9836-3897/2017 & Crl. M.A 1237/2018. The order passed by Ld. Revision Court was set aside by Hon'ble High Court and matter was remanded back to Revision Court. On 11.07.2019, Ld. Revision Court dismissed the revision petition and upheld the order dated 08.03.2017 of dismissal of application u/s 156(3) Cr.P.C.
6. FIR no.78/2017 PS EOW was already registered in compliance of order dated 08.05.2017; after investigation closure/final report dated 06.07.2021 was filed before the Ld. CMM which was registered as Cr. Case No.3969/2021. A protest petition was also filed by the complainant Page 3 of 9 but Protest petition was dismissed as withdrawn on 23.02.2023. But Ld. CMM took cognizance on closure report and issued process/summons u/s. 204 Cr.PC against the revisionist for the offence u/s 420/120B IPC.
7. Aggrieved by the issuance of summons against revisionist, the revisionist filed the present revision petition on the following grounds:
(i) Ld. CMM lost sight of the fact that the order dated 01.05.2017 passed by Ld. ASJ in Crl. Revision petition No.143/17 which lends genesis to the registration of FIR No.78/17 was no more into existence.
Ld. CMM erred in law and facts by not taking notice of the orders passed by the Hon'ble High Court dated 25.02.2019 and subsequent order of Ld. ASJ dated 11.07.2019 and took cognizance inspite of the fact that any proceedings with relation to FIR No.78/17 was not legally permissible.
(ii) Ld. CMM while passing the impungned order even ignored the fact the closure report did not name any person as accused and hence, no case was made out against the revisionist.
(iii) No reasoning has been given by the Ld. CMM while passing the summoning order and therefore, impugned order is illegal, incorrect, improper and is liable to be set aside.
8. Case file perused.
9. The FIR No. 78/2017 PS EOW was registered in compliance of order dated 01.05.2017 passed by the Ld. Revision Court in Crl. Rev. No. 143/17 but the said order dated 01.05.2017 was set aside by the Hon'ble High Court vide order dated 25.02.2019 and it was remanded back to the Ld. Revision Court to consider it afresh. In compliance of Page 4 of 9 direction given by Hon'ble High Court, Ld. Revision Court reheard the revision petition No. 143/17 and vide order dated 11.07.2019 dismissed the revision petition. So, the present FIR was registered in compliance of order which was passed in revision petition No. 143/17 but later on the said revision petition was dismissed and with its dismissal, all the orders passed in it are also got nullified.
10. The above facts are clearly mentioned by the IO in the cancellation / Final report filed in FIR No. 78/17 PS EOW and after considering the above facts and orders passed by Hon'ble High Court of Delhi and order dated 11/07/2019 passed by Ld. Revision Court, IO came to the conclusion that the FIR No. 78/17 PS EOW has become null and void.
11. When the order directing the registration of FIR has been set aside, it means that that order no more exists and consequentially all the proceedings emitting from it has also come to an end. The order for registration of FIR has become null and void and consequentially FIR No. 78/17 PS EOW becomes non-est. When no FIR is in existence, then no investigation can be conducted in it and, hence, no offence is made out. Interestingly, Ld. Trial court has not considered the above facts and it appears that Ld. Trial Court has not gone through the order passed by the Hon'ble High Court and Ld. Revision Court. So, on this ground alone the impugned summoning order dated 23.02.2023 passed by the Ld. CMM, South-East, Saket is liable to be set aside.
12. Further, between registration of FIR on 09.05.2017 and dismissal of the revision petition no. 143/17 on 11.07.2019, investigation was Page 5 of 9 conducted by the IO and he has mentioned about the investigation done by him in the Cancellation Report. The conclusion of the investigation done by the IO is mentioned in the cancellation report and as per the conclusion, complainant has made complaint on 01.02.2017 in P.S Okhla Industrial area and despite that he was doing transactions with the revisionist. Payments were made between 01.02.2017 to 10.02.2017. Payments were made by the son of complainant on 06.02.2017 and 08.02.2017 of Rs 2.5 crore and 01 crore respectively. A Transfer Memorandum was issued by Noida Authoirty in favour of Imran Ahmed Ansari. Revisionist has also sent legal notices demanding due amount and asked for registration of property in question. After agreement to sell, revisionist has moved application before consortium of bank for releasing the property and got the property released on 04.02.2017 i.e. before final payment. Even revisionist were ready to register the sale deed in favour of complainant. A Transfer Memorandum has also been created by Noida Authority in favour of son of complainant .
13. It appears that Ld. Trial Court has also not considered the investigation done by the IO and the conclusion drawn by him. No doubt court is not bound down by the conclusion drawn by the IO and on the basis of investigation done by the IO can draw its own conclusion. Law on this point is well settled and in the case of "Chittaranjan Mirdha Versus Dulal Ghosh and another" (2009) 6 SCC 661 Hon'ble the Apex Court has considered its earlier pronouncement in the case of "Gangadhar Janardan Mhatre Vs. State of Maharashtra and others", 2004 (7) SCC 768, "Bhagwant Singh Vs. Commissioner of Police and another", (1985) 2 SCC 537, "Abhinandan Jha and others Vs. Dinesh Mishra", AIR 1968 SC 117 and "M/s India Caret Private Limited Vs. Page 6 of 9 State of Karnataka and another", 1989 (2) SCC 132 again reiterated the Law at Para 9, which is reproduced hereinbelow:-
"9. When a report forwarded by the police to the Magistrate under Section 173(2) (i) is placed before him several situations arise. The report may conclude that an offence appears to have been committed by a particular person or persons and in such a case, the Magistrate may either (1) accept the report and take cognizance of the offence and issue process, or (2) may disagree with the report and drop the proceeding, or (3) may direct further investigation under Section 156(3) and require the police to make a further report. The report may on the other hand state that according to the police, no offence appears to have been committed. When such a report is placed before the Magistrate, he has again the option of adopting one of the three courses open i.e.(1) he may accept the report and drop the proceeding; or (2) he may disagree with the report and take the view that there is sufficient ground for further proceeding, take cognizance of the offence and issue process; or (3) he may direct further investigation to be made by the police under Section 156(3). The position is, therefore, now well settled that upon receipt of a police report under Section 173(2) a Magistrate is entitled to take cognizance of an offence under Section 190(1)(b) of the Code even if the police report is to the effect that no case is made out against the accused. The Magistrate can take into account the statements of the witnesses examined by the police during the investigation and take cognizance of the offence complained of and order the issue of process to the accused. Section 190(1)(b) does not lay down that a Magistrate can take cognizance of an offence only if the investigating officer gives an opinion that the investigation has made out a case against the accused. The Magistrate can ignore the conclusion arrived at by the investigating officer and independently apply his mind to the facts emerging from the investigation and take cognizance of the case, if he thinks fit, exercise his powers under Section 190(1)(b) and direct the issue of process to the accused. The Magistrate is not bound in such a situation to follow the procedure laid down in Sections 200 and 202 of the Code for taking cognizance of a case under Section 190(1)(a) though it is open to him to act under Section 200 or Section 202 also. [See India Carat (P) Ltd. v. State of Karnataka 3.] The informant is not prejudicially affected when the Magistrate decides to take cognizance and to proceed with the case. But where the Magistrate decides that sufficient ground does not subsist for proceeding further and drops the proceeding or takes the view that there is material for proceeding against some and there are insufficient grounds in Page 7 of 9 respect of others, the informant would certainly be prejudiced as the first information report lodged becomes wholly or partially ineffective. Therefore, this Court indicated in Bhagwant Singh case that where the Magistrate decides not to takecognizance and to drop the proceeding or takes a view that there is no sufficient ground for proceeding against some of the persons mentioned in the first information report, notice to the informant and grant of opportunity of being heard in the matter becomes mandatory. As indicated above,7 there is no provision in the Code for issue of a notice in that regard."
14. So, Ld. Trial Court after considering the material collected during investigation especially the statement of witnesses can form its own opinion. But it appears that in the present case, Ld. Trial court has not considered the material collected by the IO during investigation and have not dealt with the fact that even after making complaint on 01.02.2017, complainant was doing transaction with the revisionist and have received Rs.2.5 crores, whereas on the other hand, revisionist has got Transfer Memorandum dated 10.02.2017 issued by Noida Authority in favour of the complainant and have also got the property released from the consortium of banks after repaying complete mortgaged amount before receiving last tranche of payment from complainant. Ld. Trial Court has not considered these vital facts. Further, no reason has been given in the impugned order by the Ld. Trial Court for forming a different opinion / conclusion from that of the Investigating Officer.
15. In the present case, there is a palpable error in non compliance with the order passed by the Hon'ble High Court and Ld. Revision Court, the impugned order is passed without applying judicial mind to the facts collected during investigation and summoning order is completed erroneous.
Page 8 of 916. In view of the discussion above, the revision petition is hereby allowed and the impugned order dated 23.02.2023 qua the summoning of revisionist is hereby set aside.
17. Copy of this order be sent to the Ld. Trial Court.
18. Revision file be consigned to the Record Room after due compliance.
Vipin Digitally signed
by Vipin Kharb
Date: 2026.01.03
Kharb 16:11:21 +0530
Dictated and Announced in the (Vipin Kharb)
open Court on 03.01.2026 ASJ-07(South-East)/Saket Courts
New Delhi
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