Delhi District Court
Ramesh Chand vs State Of Nct Of Delhi on 24 April, 2025
CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another
IN THE COURT OF MANU GOEL KHARB:
SPECIAL JUDGE (NDPS)-02 SOUTH WEST DISTRICT
DWARKA COURTS:NEW DELHI
CR no. 02/2020
CNR No.DLSW01-014712-2019
Ramesh Chand
S/o Sh. Raghu Nath
R/o House no. 47,
Kakrola Housing Complex,
Kakrola Delhi.
.....Revisionist
VERSUS
1. State NCT of Delhi
2. Jai Chand
3. Amarjeet S/o Sh. Jai Chand
(respondent no. 2 and 3 summoned
vide order dated 09.04.2024)
.... Respondents
Date of Institution of the Appeal : 06.01.2020
Date of Arguments : 12.11.2024
Date of Judgment : 24.04.2025
JUDGMENT
1. This is a petition under section 397 Cr.P.C. 1973, preferred by revisionist against the impugned order dated 06.12.2019 passed by the court of Sh. Deepak Kumar, Ld. MM-II, South West District, Dwarka Courts, New Delhi whereby petitioner's protest petition was dismissed and the closure report filed by the police in case FIR No.153/2015 P.S. Dwarka North was accepted by the Ld. Trial Court.
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2. Brief facts of the case are that in the month of April-2011, petitioner purchased property bearing House no. C-8, Nishant Park Kakrola from two co-owners i.e. Veer Bala and Daya Devi through their elder Sh. Rohtash Singh Chauhan (father-in-law and father respectively and now expired) and for which consideration amount was paid by him after withdrawing Rs. 4,00,000/- from his bank and remaining Rs. 18,00,000/- was borrowed from a relative Om Parkash Nahar. It is stated that on 25.04.2011, petitioner took both sellers to District Centre, Janakpuri for execution of sale documents and called his elder brother Jai Chand and his son Amarjeet to accompany him. Sale documents were got prepared by Jai Chand and Amarjeet and the respondent Jai Chand fraudulently put his own name as purchaser and petitioner Ramesh Chand was shown as an attesting witness and the respondents also took the original purchase documents from petitioner on pretext of keeping it in safe custody. After sometime, the respondents got inducted Amarjeet Singh in the said house as a tenant by falsely coaxing on the plea that his ill wife will receive better treatment.
A police complaint was made by the petitioner at P.S. Dwarka North and DCP office regarding the forgery and cheating committed by Jai Chand and his son, however, police did not take any action against them. Thereafter, petitioner filed complaint under section 156(3) Cr.P.C. before the Ld. Trial Court and the Ld. Trial Court vide order dated 09.02.2015 allowed the application of the Page 2 of 11 CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another complainant under section 156(3) Cr.P.C. and directed the police to register an FIR.
3. In compliance of directions of Ld. Metropolitan Magistrate, an FIR bearing no. 153/2015 (impugned FIR) was registered at P.S. Dwarka North under section 420/452/406/419/468/471/383/506/34 IPC.
4. After investigation, IO filed closure report.
Thereafter petitioner filed Protest Petition and the Ld. Trial Court dismissed the Protest Petition vide the impugned order dated 06.12.2019.
5. Aggrieved by the said order, revisionist has filed the present petition on the following grounds :
(i) that the Ld. Trial Court failed to appreciate that oral evidence is also a legitimate adducement of evidence and that the documents which were neither verified nor investigated could not form part of valid documents.
(ii) that the Ld. Trial Court failed to appreciate that there was adequate material on record to prove that consideration was between the petitioner and the sellers only.
(iii) That the 'sellers' have vouched before the police to have transacted the property with the petitioner alone to whom the delivery/ possession was passed Page 3 of 11 CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another on and the documents need thorough verification and investigation.
(iv) That Ld. Trial Court failed to appreciate that Jai Chand being the elder brother of the petitioner knew more about the transaction of properties and that no prudent person would think that his own elder brother would betray petitioner's trust by getting the documents typed in a fraudulent manner.
(v) The findings given by the Ld. Trial Court that 'man may lie but documents don't' is half way and the same is not true in case of tainted documents.
(vi) That Ld. Trial Court did not go through the statements/deposition of the witnesses in the parallel civil case between the parties.
(vii) That order of Ld. Trial Court is arbitrary and perverse and deserves to be set aside.
6. Notice of the revision petition was sent to the respondents who appeared and addressed oral arguments. Respondents Jai Chand and Amarjeet filed copy of the judgment delivered by the Court of Ld. ADJ-01 in the civil suit for declaration, possession and permanent injunction filed by Ramesh Chand against Jai Chand. It is argued by the ld. Counsel for respondents that the property in question was purchased by Jai Chand from Smt. Vir Bala and Smt. Dayawati and the complainant Ramesh Chand was one of the witnesses at the time of execution of documents. It is further stated that the respondents are also Page 4 of 11 CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another in continuous peaceful possession of the property since the date of its purchase. Ld. Counsel for respondents further submitted that the respondent had purchased the property on the basis of notarized GPA and entry in this regard can also be found in the Notary Register of the Notary namely Sh. S. D. Attri and the notarized documents contained the photographs of the parties who had purchased or had sold the property i.e. the photograph of Jai Chand and not the complainant Ramesh Chand. Accordingly, it is submitted that there is no perversity in the order passed by the Ld. MM and the present revision petition may be dismissed with exemplary cost.
7. I have heard the submissions of the revisionist/ complainant and Ld. Counsel for the respondents and gone through the closure report filed by the police as well as the Protest Petition and impugned order dated 06.12.2019.
8. It is a settled proposition of law that the revisional jurisdiction of the court cannot be equated with appellate jurisdiction. In its revisional jurisdiction, the Court can examine the records of any proceedings for satisfying itself as to the correctness, legality or propriety of any finding, sentence or order. There has to be perversity or unreasonableness, complete misreading of records leading to the court taking into consideration irrelevant material while ignoring relevant material, when alone the Court Page 5 of 11 CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another would exercise its revisional jurisdiction to set aside such order/judgment.
9. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in Sanjaysinh Ramrao Chavan Vs. Dattatray Gulabrao Phalke & Others, 2015 (3) SCC 123, has held as under :-
"14. .... Unless the order passed by the Magistrate is perverse or the view taken by the court is wholly unreasonable or there is non-consideration of any relevant material or there is palpable misreading of records, the Revisional Court is not justified in setting aside the order, merely because another view is possible. The Revisional Court is not meant to act as an appellate court. The whole purpose of the revisional jurisdiction is to preserve the power in the court to do justice in accordance with the principles of criminal jurisprudence. The revisional power of the court under Sections 397 to 401 CrPC is not to be equated with that of an appeal. Unless the finding of the court, whose decision is sought to be revised, is shown to be perverse or untenable in law or is grossly erroneous or glaringly unreasonable or where the decision is based on no material or where the material facts are wholly ignored or where the judicial discretion is exercised arbitrarily or capriciously, the courts may not interfere with decision in exercise of their revisional jurisdiction........"
10. In the present case, the petitioner is alleging that sale documents regarding the property in question have been executed on the basis of fraud by respondent Jai Chand and Amarjeet. The petitioner alleges that the property was purchased by him and that his brother Jai Chand deliberately incorporated his own name as buyer and name of the petitioner as an attesting witness during the execution of the said documents, whereas, the respondents alleged that no such fraud was committed and the Page 6 of 11 CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another documents were legally and validly executed in favor of the right person in the presence of Notary and attesting witnesses.
11. During investigation, IO recorded the statements of the joint sellers namely Daya Devi and Veerbala and the independent witness Hitender u/s 161 CrPC. IO has also recorded the statement of petitioner Ramesh Chand and his son Kamraj and he also prepared the interrogation report of the respondents Jai Chand and Amarjeet.
Out of the two co-sellers, the seller Veerbala has given her statement in support of the case of the petitioner whereas the statement of Dayawati @ Dayadevi favors the respondent. Similarly, the statement of attesting witness namely Hitender is in support of the case put forth by the petitioner. Apart from these three persons, IO had also recorded the statement of Om Prakash Nahar and Ved Prakash Nahar u/s 161 Cr.P.C.
12. According to the version of the complainant/ revisionist, sale consideration of Rs. 21 lacs was paid by him by taking a loan of Rs. 18 lacs from O. P. Nahar and withdrawing Rs. 4 lacs from his bank account. On the other hand, respondent Jai Chand has stated before the IO in the interrogation that he had received money from O. P. Nahar through his brother/ petitioner Ramesh. O. P. Nahar gave his statement u/s 161 Cr.P.C. that he had given Rs 18 lacs to Ramesh as interest free loan for purchase of the Page 7 of 11 CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another property in question. From the statements of both Ramesh and Jai Chand, one thing is clear that the amount of Rs. 18 lacs was handed over by O. P. Nahar to Ramesh and the only thing to be decided is whether the same was given as loan to Ramesh or Jai Chand for purchasing the property.
13. It is a matter of record that prior to the registration of the present FIR, when the matter was pending at the stage of consideration on the application under section 156 (3) Cr.P.C., then at that time preliminary inquiry was conducted by Enquiry officer SI Manoj Bhatia, upon which he filed a report dated 23.08.2014 alongwith the statements of both the sellers namely Veerbala and Daya Devi/Dayawati and in the said statements, not only Veerbala but the co-seller Daya Devi had also given her statement that the house in question was sold to Ramesh Chand. The documents regarding the property in question were notarized in April 2011. O. P. Nahar clearly stated before the IO that he gave Rs 18 lacs to Ramesh for purchase of the property in question. Now, if we see the statement of bank account of O. P. Nahar filed by the IO, it clearly shows that an amount of Rs. 20 lacs was withdrawn by him from his account by way of cheque on 04.04.2011. Further, the statement of account of petitioner Ramesh Chand also shows a withdrawal of Rs. 4 lacs as mentioned by him in his complaint whereas during the preliminary inquiry no cash withdrawn was found in the Statement of Account of respondent Jai Chand.
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14. During the arguments on the present petition, ld.
Counsel for respondents had filed before the court a copy of the judgment dated 29.01.2020 of the court of Ld. ADJ-01 in the civil suit for declaration, possession and permanent injunction filed by the petitioner against the respondents. Although, the suit was dismissed by the court of Ld. ADJ-01, however, para 37 of the judgment records the defence taken by DW1 i.e. respondent Jai Chand herein during his court testimony and the relevant portion of the said judgment is reproduced as here under :
"DW-1 purchased the suit property from its previous owners Daya Devi and Veerbala through the agency of their relative Sh. Rohtash Chauhan for an amount of Rs. 21,00,000/-. DW-1 has purchased some property in Village Nizampur, Delhi on 19.07.1993 for Rs 1,80,000/- and said property was mortgaged on 24.04.2011 to Sh. Rajesh Kumar Joon, who had given a loan of Rs. 21,00,000/- to defendant no. 1 till the retrial benefits are released to defendant no. 1. The suit property was purchased by defendant no. 1 from the said amount....."
15. From the reply given by the respondent during his interrogation by the IO and the court testimony as reproduced above, it is evident that the respondent has made contradictory statement regarding the source of funds. The stance raised by the respondent before the court of Ld. ADJ-01 was not raised by him before the IO during investigation of the offence. The said document/judgment is relied upon by the respondent himself, hence, there is all the more reason to rely upon the same but the same has rather exposed the fraud committed by the respondent.
Page 9 of 11CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another Moreover, no bank account statement has been filed by the respondent to show that he received Rs. 21 lacs from any source or had repaid the same to anyone. Furthermore, if the reply given by the respondent before the IO is closely read, it discloses the transaction of merely Rs. 5 lacs with O. P. Nahar and there is no clear answer as to why O P Nahar had given him such huge amount and how the same was to be repaid.
16. The judgment filed by the respondent was not filed before the Ld. Trial Court because the judgment of civil court came in the year 2020, whereas the cancellation report was filed by the IO in June 2018. Hence, to that extent there is no illegality or perversity in the order of the Trial Court while accepting the closure report on the basis of material available before the Ld. Trial Court but at the same time while accepting the closure report, it was incumbent upon the Ld. Trial Court to take cognizance upon the contents as mentioned in the Protest Petition and treated as a complaint under section 200 Cr.P.C. and proceed accordingly. However, the same has not been done and the Protest Petition was out rightly dismissed without affording any further opportunity to the petitioner to lead evidence.
17. In the light of the aforesaid discussion, the impugned order dated 06.12.2019 is set aside as there is sufficient material for not concurring with the cancellation Page 10 of 11 CR No. 02/2020 Ramesh Chand Vs State & Another report filed by the police. Accordingly, Ld. Trial Court is directed to take cognizance of the offence as mentioned in the FIR.
18. Copy of the order be sent to Ld. Trial Court for necessary information and compliance.
19. Revision file be consigned to record room after due compliance. Digitally signed MANU by MANU GOEL KHARB GOEL Date:
2025.04.24 Pronounced in the open Court today KHARB 17:16:26 +0530 i.e. 24.04.2025 (Manu Goel Kharb) Spl. Judge (NDPS-02), Dwarka Courts, New Delhi Page 11 of 11