Madhya Pradesh High Court
Hri Shankar Shrivastava vs Umahsnkar Sen on 22 February, 2018
1
HIGH COURT OF MADHYA PRADESH AT JABALPUR
SINGLE BENCH : HON'BLE SHRI JUSTICE ATUL SREEDHARAN
M.Cr.C No. 1088 of 2010
Hari Shankar Shrivastava
Vs.
Umashankar Sen
:Shri Anil Khare, Sr.Advocate with
For Petitioner
Shri Abhijit Shrivastava and Abhinav
Shrivastava, Advocates.
For Respondent : Shri G.L. Patel, Advocate.
ORDER
( 22.2.2018)
1. The present petition has been filed by the Petitioner seeking the exercise of plenary powers by this court under Section 482 of Cr.P.C and quash the order dated 24-09-2009 and all proceedings arising therefrom, passed by the Court of learned Judicial Magistrate First Class, Jabalpur in Criminal Complaint Case No. 11998/09 ( Umashankar Sen Vs. Ramji Patel and two others), by which the learned court below was pleased to take cognizance of offences under Sections 420, 467, 468 and 471/34 of IPC against the Petitioner, based upon the complaint filed by the Respondent. The court issued bailable warrant against the Petitioner and two other persons. 2
2. This court vide order dated 08-02-2010 issued notice to the Respondent and also stayed the proceedings in the complaint case pending before the Learned Judicial Magistrate First Class, Jabalpur. By the said complaint, the Respondent seeks to prosecute the Petitioner Harishankar Shrivastava, presently aged about 94 years as so stated by the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the Petitioner, for an alleged offence committed in the year 1966. The complaint case has been filed in the year 2006 i.e, a full 40 years after the commission of the alleged offence.
3. The complaint case which give rise to the present quash petition, was filed by the Respondent who is the complainant before the learned court below. The complaint was filed against the Petitioner herein, who is the accused No. 2, Ramji Patel and Ram Prakash Sharma. Ramji Patel and Ram Prakash Sharma, are no more and therefore, the petition has been preferred only by the sole surviving accused in the complaint case, Mr. Harishankar Shrivastava.
4. In the complaint, the complainant has stated that the ancestral land belonging to the grandmother of the complainant's father being Mauza Hathital Bandobast 753, Patwari Halka No. 24/2 and Khasra No. 68/2, which was in the joint names of the father of the complainant the late Raghuvir Sen, his elder brother Mangal Sen and his grandmother 3 Chinna Bai from the year 1953 till the date of filing of the complaint. The said names are stated to be in all government and revenue records. Chinna Bai is the wife of Manaklal and thus, the mother of Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen. In paragraph-2 of the complaint, the complainant states that the Petitioner and the other co-accused persons, on 16-08-1965, prepared a fabricated agreement to the effect that the complainant's late father and his uncle had executed the said agreement using their pet names/ aliases names/home names. The names of sellers used in the said agreement were Ravishankar and Tejilal, which according to the complainant were never used by them said persons for any formal or legal purposes. In paragraph-3, the complainant states that the Petitioner and the other co-accused persons executed a fabricated sale deed dated 31-01-1966, in which the sellers are shown as the father and uncle of the complainant, who are stated to have signed the said documents, not in their real names but, using their aliases. The complainant further states that his father and his uncle never executed any sale deed using their aliases. He has also stated that the property in question is not borne in any revenue record in the aliases used by the complainant's father and his uncle. It is also alleged that in the sale deed of 31-01-1966, the grandmother of the complainant Chinna Bai was not a signatory. The complainant says 4 that he came to know about the said offence having been committed in the year 1966, only in the year 2003 and thereafter, he has stated to have got his statement recorded before the Naib Tahsildar to the effect that at no point of time was the said land in question ie, Khasra No. 68/2, sold by them. Thus, the Petitioner is alleged to have fabricated a fake registered sale deed in his favour in the year 1966. The allegation is bald and the complaint does not elaborate as to how and when it was fabricated.
5. In the complaint, it was also alleged that the land which was shown to have been sold was 0.73 hectares and that instead of 0.73, an area of 0.50 hectares was got diverted by the Petitioner in connivance with the government officials. Thereafter, on the basis of the allegations made in the complaint and the statement of Umashankar Sen recorded under Section 200 of Cr.P.C, the learned court below, vide impugned order dated 24-09-2009, passed an order for registration of the case against the Petitioner and two other accused persons punishable under Sections 420, 467, 468, 471/34 of IPC. The only allegations that seems to be levelled in the complaint is that the sale deed dated 31-01- 1966 is fabricated because the names of the sellers are reflected as Ravishankar and Tejilal. The complainant says that his father Raghuvir Sen and his uncle Mangal Sen never used their aliases/ nick 5 names while executing sale deeds and the land, which is khasra No. 68/2 is entered in the revenue records in the names of Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai. This is the only circumstance on the basis of which, the sale deed is said to have been fabricated. There is no categorical allegation in the complaint that Ravishankar and Tejilal, the sellers in the sale deed are not Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen. It is also necessary to mention here that after the sale deed was executed by Ravishankar and Tejilal in the year 1966 in favour of the Petitioner and the co-accused persons, the Petitioner and the co- accused persons sold parts of the land of the khasra No. 68/2 by way of six sale deeds to Nalmush, Smt. Rampyari Bai, Smt. Amrish Kaur, Smt. Gurmit Kaur and Kripal Singh.Between 1966-69, , The land that was sold admeasured 13959 sq. ft, out of 16,1117 sq. ft of Khasra No. 68/2. The remaining land was used in the construction of roads.
6. A civil suit was preferred by the uncle of the complainant ie, Mangal Sen and others being the plaintiffs and the Petitioner and the co- accused persons were defendants. The suit is Civil Suit No. 299A/03. It was filed for declaration and permanent injunction with regard to Khasra No. 68/2. The suit was subsequently re-numbered as 69A/04 and finally as Suit No. 47A/15. Undisputedly, this suit is still pending. 6
7. The contention of the learned counsel appearing for the Petitioner is that the complaint case is malafide and has been filed with an oblique motive of arm twisting the Petitioner into submission and try to achieve a result in his favour faster than what a proceeding before the civil court could bring about. The Petitioner is the sole surviving, original purchaser. The Ld. Senior Counsel appearing for the Petitioner has also argued that the genuineness and validity of the sale deed dated 31-01-1966 and the question whether Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen are the same as Ravishankar and Tejilal are issues in the Civil Suit which is pending adjudication.
8. The name of the Petitioner along with two other co-accused persons were mutated into the revenue records with regard to record of Khasra No. 68/2 on 30-11-1970. The father, uncle and grandmother of the complainant moved an application before the Tahsildar for rectification of the revenue records by removal of the names of the Petitioner and the co-accused persons from the revenue records and reinsertion of the names of Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai as bhu swamis in the revenue records against Khasra No. 68/2. The Tahsildar, vide order dated 08-12-2005, allowed the said application and mutated the names of Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai 7 in the place of the Petitioner and co-accused persons in relation to khasra No. 68/2.
9. Against the order of the Tahsildar dated 08-12-2005, the Petitioner and the co-accused persons filed an appeal before the court of Sub- Divisional Officer. The SDO, vide order dated 21-08-2006, set aside the order of the Naib Tahsildar dated 08-12-2005, by which names of Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai were inserted into the revenue records. Against the order of the SDO dated 21-08-2006, the father, uncle and grandmother of the complainant preferred an appeal before the Additional Commissioner, Jabalpur, who dismissed the appeal, thereby affirming the order passed by the SDO dated 21-08- 2006. Ld. Counsel for the Respondent has submitted that a revision has been preferred on behalf of Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai before the Board of Revenue which is still pending.
10. The only issues that arises for consideration is whether the complaint case is a malafide act on the part of the Respondent which has been filed after the passage of forty years after the commission of the alleged offence and whether the same is an abuse of the process of justice, filed only with the intention of browbeating the Petitioner who is aged ninety four years, to make him relent to the Respondent. The other issue is whether Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen are also referred 8 to by their aliases of Ravishankar and Tejilal. The main ground in the complaint case is that their nick names/ aliases were never used by Raghivir Sen and Mangal Sen for the purposes of executing sale deeds. In this regard, learned counsel for the Petitioner has drawn the attention of this court to Annexure-E at Page-30 of IA No. 2204/18, which is a copy of the death certificate of the father of the complainant, who died on 09-02-1994. The father of the complainant has been referred to in the death certificate as Ravishankar Sen, which is the alias for Raghuvir Sen. The father of the deceased is shown as Manaklal, which confirms that Ravishankar Sen, who in mentioned in the death certificate is none other than the father of the Respondent, Raghuvir Sen. It is undisputed that the father of Raghuvir Sen was Manaklal. The contents of the death certificate have not been disputed to by the Respondent. Thereafter, the attention of this court is also drawn to Annexure-F at page-31, which is a certificate issued from the office of the Executive Engineer, Hiran Water Supplies Division, Jabalpur dated 21-04-2005 in which it is given "mijksDr fo"k; ds laca/k esa ys[k gS fd miyC/k 'kkldh; vfHkys[kksa ds vk/kkj ij vkidks voxr djk;k tkrk gS fd Jh fnyhi dqekj lsu nSfud osru Hkksxh deZpkjh ds firk dk uke Lo0 Jh jfo'kadj lsu gSA^^
11. It is undisputed that Dilip Sen referred to in the certificate is the brother of the complainant. This is another document on the basis of 9 which the learned counsel for the Petitioner has postulated that Raghuvir Sen, the father of the Respondent, was also referred to as Ravishankar Sen even in official documents. Annexure-G at page-32 of the I.A is an extract from the Voters list pertaining to Ward No. 46 of the Municipal Corporation of Jabalpur in which the particulars of Mangal Sen, the uncle of the complainant, is given at Serial No. 70. His house number is 2233 and the name of the voter is given as Tejilal s/o Manaklal. This document is of the year 2004. The documents mentioned above also clearly reveal that the father of Tejilal and Ravishankar is one and the same person i.e., Manaklal Sen. It also establishes that Mangal Sen is also referred to as Tejilal even in official documents. This document also has not been disputed by the Respondent.
12. It is relevant to mention here that an application was filed by the plaintiff in the civil suit for temporary injunction which was dismissed by the court of learned 2nd Civil Judge, Class-II vide order dated 17/07/06. In paragraph-5 of the said order, it is revealed that what influenced the learned court below to dismiss the said application were the three documents referred to earlier, on the basis of which, the learned court below held in favour of the Petitioner herein and other 10 co-defendants in the suit that prima facie Raghuvir and Mangal are also known as Ravishankar and Tejilal.
13. Learned counsel for the Respondent has drawn the attention of this court to the documents filed by the Respondent vide IA 2816/18. The first document that the learned counsel for the Respondent has drawn the attention of this court to is the Rin Pustika, which was issued for the land bearing khasra No. 68/2. The names of the persons against whom the said land stood as per the entry in the said Rin Pustika was that of Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai. Attention of this court was drawn to the top portion of the Rin Pustika to show that after the death of three persons, the names of complainant Umashankar and his brother Dilip were entered into the Rin Pustika in the place of Ravishankar Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai. Thereafter, he has drawn the attention of this court to the Khasra Panchsala of the year 2008-09, in which the names of Dilip and Umashankar are reflected in the revenue records for the land on khasra No. 68/2. He has also drawn the attention of this court to the document which is the khasra Panchsala relating to khasra No. 68/2 which reflected the names of Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai continuously from 1954-56 and thereafter, from 1964-68. 11
14. Thus, it has been submitted on behalf of the Respondent that the original land owner was Manaklal. Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai were the sons and wife of the original owner of the said land. The complainant Umashankar and Dilip are the sons of Raghuvir Sen. After the demise of Raghuvir Sen, Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai, there were no other claimants to the land upon khasra No. 68/2 besides the complainant Umashankar and his brother Dilip. Raghuvir Sen died on 09/02/94. Mangal Sen and Chinna Bai both died in the year 2009 i.e, after the registration of the complaint case. Learned counsel for the Respondent has argued that the land was mutated in the names of the complainant and his brother Dilip in the first revenue records vide order dated 08/12/05 passed by the Tahsildar after being satisfied of the alleged fraud played by the Petitioner and the co- accused persons in getting their names mutated in the revenue records in the year 1975.
15. Learned counsel for the Respondent has not disputed the fact that the order of the Tahsildar was challenged by the Petitioner and co-accused persons before the Sub-Divisional Officer, who vide order dated 21/08/06 had set aside the order of the Tahsildar by holding that Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen were also identified and referred to by the names of Ravishankar and Tejilal. It is also not disputed by the 12 learned counsel for the Respondent that against the order of the learned Sub-Divisional Officer dated 21-08-2006, the complainant had preferred an appeal before the Revenue Commissioner which was also dismissed vide order dated 17/10/16. Learned counsel for the Respondent has also stated that the order passed in appeal dated 17/10/16 was challenged by the complainant before the Board of Revenue in a revision, which is still pending.
16. Learned counsel for the Respondent thereafter, has drawn the attention of this court to a report of the Sub-Divisional Officer dated 09-05-2005, in which the Sub-Divisional Officer has opined in paragraph-10 that there has been manipulation of the records, which is prima facie seen and that the registered sale deed, by whose names reflected against the khasra number in the revenue records are different from the names of the sellers in the sale deed of 1966. On the basis of this, learned counsel for the Respondent has submitted that at the stage of issuing summons to the prospective accused, all that needs to be seen is a whether prima facie case has been made out against the Petitioner and the co-accused persons. According to him, the report of the Sub-Divisional Officer dated 09/05/05, was adequate to satisfy the prima facie requirement of issuing process to the Petitioner. He has further stated that this report has been referred to by 13 the complainant in his complaint before the Judicial Magistrate First Class, Jabalpur. On the basis of this, learned counsel for the Respondent has prayed that the petition be dismissed.
17. In his rejoinder, the learned Senior counsel appearing on behalf of the Petitioner referred to the order dated 28/01/06 passed by the Sub- Divisional Officer, who has taken a different view and has concluded that though names of sellers are different in the sale deed from their names in the revenue records, both the names referred to same persons. Besides, the Ld. Counsel has reiterated the contents of the death certificate relating to Raghuvir Sen refers to him name as Ravishankar. Also, the certificate issued by the government office where the brother of the complainant works reflects the name of the father of the complainant and his brother once again as Ravishankar instead of Raghuvir Sen and lastly, the voter list of the Municipal Corporation at Jabalpur relating to Ward No. 46, wherein at Serial No. 70, the details of the uncle of the complainant gives name as Tejilal s/o Manaklal. Learned counsel for the Petitioner has also referred to the judgment of the Supreme Court reported in 2009 (8) SCC 751 Mohammad Ibrahim and others Vs. State of Bihar and another. The details of the judgment will be discussed later. 14
18. Heard the learned counsel for the parties and perused the record of the case. It is undisputed that the alleged offence, if at all was committed is on 31/01/1966. The complaint with regard to the same has been filed 40 years thereafter, in the year 2006. Post cognizance, the impugned order summoning the Petitioner to stand trial was issued on 24/09/09. At that point of time, the Petitioner, who is the sole surviving accused in this case was aged about 85 years. Today, he is 94 years old. The age of an accused person would be of no consequence in a situation where there is evidence of him having committed an offence which is writ large, or where the material on record discloses a strong prima facie involvement of the person in the offence, or where such person has deliberately tried to evade the process of justice and has kept himself concealed so as to evade the initiation or continuation of proceedings against him. However, in cases which fall under the penumbra of criminal liability, where the preponderant facts overwhelmingly point towards a civil liability and where the delay in launching the prosecution is not attributable to any action or omission on the part of the prospective accused, then in such cases, the age of the accused would be seen as a reckoning factor along with other attending circumstances, while deciding a quash petition at his instance.
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19. The first aspect that this court would explore is whether a criminal case could have been filed earlier than the year 2006 and how tenable is the contention of the Respondent that the complaint case is sustainable because he came to know of the alleged fraud only in the year 2006? Undoubtedly, the complainant was not even born on the date on which, the alleged offence took place on 31/01/1966. The father of the Respondent died on 09/02/1994 and the complainant's uncle and grandmother died in the year 2009. It is also undisputed that though the Respondent was living away from khasra No. 68/2, the said plot of land, admittedly is not more than 1 to 2 kilometres away from where the complainant lives. It is highly improbable and extremely fanciful that Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen would have never ever come to know about the alleged fraud committed against the property, which was just about two kilometres away from the place where they were residing. The complainant says that in the year 2003, when he went there to do some work, he found that the land was in possession of someone else and there was construction which was erected on the said land and it is at that point of time, he came to know of the offence. The said argument is completely untenable and deserves to be rejected for two reasons :-
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(a) Firstly, the father of the complainant Raghuvir Sen and his uncle Mangal Sen never informed the complainant about the so-called fraud perpetrated upon them by the Petitioner and the co-accused persons in relation to Khasra No. 68/2 which was highly improbable if they felt that the Petitioner and the co-accused person were in illegal occupation of their land, and;
(b) Secondly, It is against the normal course of human conduct that an owner of property which is situated no more than 2 kilometres from his place of residence, would remain blissfully unaware of any illegal occupation of his property by the Petitioner and the co-
accused persons for more than three decades.
20. As regards the identity of Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen, the fact that they were known also by their aliases Ravishankar and Tejilal is not denied by the complainant in the complaint. The allegation of the complainant is limited to the extent that Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen never used the aliases of Ravishankar and Tejilal while executing sale deeds. It has not been alleged by the complainant that someone else has signed as Ravishankar and Tejilal. In the judgement of the Hon'ble Supreme Court reported in 2009 (8) SCC 751 Mohammad 17 Ibrahim and others Vs. State of Bihar and another, relied upon by the learned counsel for the Petitioner, a similar case came up before the Hon'ble Supreme Court. In that case, the seller is stated to have sold land not belonging to him to the buyer. The complainant in that case before the Hon'ble Supreme Court was not the buyer. The complainant was a third person, who claimed that the land so sold, was a part of his land. The Supreme Court voiced its concern in paragraph 8 of the judgment that time and again it had drawn attention to the propensity of unscrupulous individuals to give the cloak of criminality to civil disputes in order to bring to bear illegitimate pressure on the accused or to settle old scores. It however did caution that there would be a category of cases which would entail elements of both, a civil dispute and a criminal act. In paragraph 16 of the judgement, it was held that there was a fundamental difference between a person who sold land not belong to him, as his own land and a case where the seller impersonated someone else other than himself, while selling the land. It held that it was not sufficient that a document was made or executed dishonestly or fraudulently and that there was a further requirement that the document was made with the intention of causing it to be believed that it was executed by or with the authority of the person by whom or by whose authority, the 18 accused knew that it was not so executed. The Hon'ble Supreme Court after analysing S. 464 IPC held in paragraph 14 of the judgement that forgery, can be committed only where there is a fabrication of a false document. Enunciating what a false document meant, the Supreme Court held that (a) there must be an execution of a document by a person, claiming to be someone else or authorised by someone else,
(b) the document must be altered or tampered with and (c) the person so accused has procured the document by practising deception or from a person who was not in control of his senses. it would not be an act of forgery where a man sells off the land even though, it does not belong to him but portraying the seller correctly. In that case, it was not the complainant's allegations that the seller impersonated someone else and posed as the seller and sold off his land. The Hon'ble Supreme Court also observed that the buyer has never preferred a complaint and it was a third person who had filed the complaint against the Petitioner in that case. The Supreme Court also issues a clarification in paragraph-23 of the judgment, that it should not be misunderstood to mean that in every case where a person, who does not have ownership or right over a particular piece of land, sells it to another, no criminal case is maintainable. The Supreme Court clarifies that the buyer in such a case would have reasonable cause to sustain a 19 criminal case against the seller but, not to a third person. In the case before this Court, there is no allegation in the complaint that the signatures on the sale deed executed in the year 1966, were not of Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen. Instead it was only alleged that Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen never signed a sale deed using their aliases of Ravishankar and Tejilal.
21. In this case, the complaint has been preferred after 40 years and no reasonable cause has been given by the complainant for the delay. The reason given by the complainant that he came to know of the offence in the year 2003 is specious as already stated hereinabove, on account of the fact that Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen also did not disclose any criminality by the Petitioner and held their peace for more than 30 years. The entire controversy started when the complainant came to know that the property lay mutated in the names of the Petitioner and the co-accused persons from the year 1975. He moves an application before the Tahsildar for deletion of names of the Petitioner and the co- accused persons and the insertion of his name and his brother's in the land revenue records. The first thing that the father of the complainant does is actually preferring a civil suit and take action on the revenue side. The complaint case is filed after a delay of almost three years from the time that the complainant comes to know sometime in the 20 year 2003 about the alleged fraud played in the year 1966. Therefore, it is apparent that the case has been filed against the Petitioner with the sole intention of harassing him while there was civil suit pending and also a revision under the relevant provisions of the Madhya Pradesh Land Revenue Code, before the Board of Revenue, against the order of the Commissioner in appeal dated 17/10/16.
22. The Supreme Court in Savitri Pandey and another Versus State of Uttar Pradesh and Others - (2015) 13 SCC 95, was concerned with a case very similar on facts to the case under consideration before this Court. The complainant in the case before the Supreme Court, had got registered an FIR against the accused persons on 01/08/14 under sections 420, 467, 468, 471, 120-B, 504 and 506 IPC, stating that the land owned by her was got executed in favour of different persons in the year 1994. The appellants before the Supreme Court were arraigned as Accused No. 14 and 15. No specific allegations were levelled against them. The High Court had dismissed the quash petition moved by the Appellant in that case. In paragraph 10 of the judgement, the Hon'ble Supreme Court held that there has been a glaring abuse of process on the part of the complainant as (a) the sale deeds were executed in the year 1994 and the complainant has woken up after nineteen years to register the FIR, alleging that the registered 21 sale deeds are fraudulent. (b) the Supreme Court held that the complainant had never filed a civil suit for the cancellation of the sale deed on the ground that they were fraudulently executed. (c) that the accused and the complainant are close relatives having their lands next to each other in the village, of which the sale deeds have been executed and (d) there is no specific allegation against the appellants as to how they have participated in the commission of the offence. On the basis of the said findings, the case against the appellants was quashed by the Supreme Court.
23. The abovementioned case is squarely applicable to the facts circumstance of the case under consideration by this Court. In this case, the complainant has woken up after the passage of forty years from the date on which the sale deed was executed. The father and uncle of the complainant were the original sellers of the land to the Petitioner and the co-accused persons in the year 1966. Throughout their lifetime, they lived just two kilometres from the land in question and never raised any objection with regard to the sale deed or the continued occupation of the land by the Petitioner and the co-accused persons. The Civil Suit filed by the Respondent No.2 is still pending adjudication. The issue raised in the civil suit dwells into the validity of the sale deed executed in the year 1966 and therefore, the very 22 registration of the complaint case against the Petitioner, forty years after the execution of the sale deed is a clear abuse of process.
24. Though, there is no limitation in the filing of a criminal case for those offences providing for a jail sentence beyond three years, the delay must also been seen in the backdrop of the fundamental right of the Petitioner to a speedy trial. Thus, in a case like this, where ex facie the narrative in the complaint case itself shows, a case to be predominantly a civil dispute, and where the criminal case has been filed in order to harass the Petitioner after a passage of 40 years, it would be, ex debito justitiae, that this Court exercises its plenary powers under section 482 Cr. P.C and quash the proceedings against the Petitioner. This court is aware that merely because a civil liability is present in a given set of circumstances, it does not preclude the registration of a criminal offence in such a case. However, in those cases, which fall at a point of intersection between a civil and a criminal case, where the material on record cannot be said to be such that it discloses an undeniable prima facie case against the accused persons, the continuation of such a criminal case would be vexatious.
25. In this regard, there are a plethora of case law of the Hon'ble Supreme Court laying down clearly that the right to a speedy trial is intrinsically linked with the right to life itself under Article 21 of the 23 Constitution. In the facts circumstances of this case, which reflects that the Petitioner is ninety-four years of age, that right of the Petitioner to a speedy trial stands severely infracted.
26. Under the circumstances, this Court is of the considered opinion that the case against the Petitioner deserves to be quashed as (a) the Respondent has sought to prosecute the Petitioner for the offence mentioned hereinabove after the passage of forty years which is ex facie a vexatious and a malicious prosecution. (b) there is no specific allegation in the complaint that the sale deed of 1966 does not bear the signature of Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen and the only allegation is that the said persons never signed deeds of sale using their aliases of Ravishankar and Tejilal (c) there is substantial and undisputed material in this case which has been referred and discussed in the preceding paragraphs, that Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen used their aliases and were frequently know by the aliases of Ravishankar and Tejilal even in official documents. (d) there is not a single specific allegation in the entire complaint as to how the Petitioner can be held guilty of the offences alleged against him, no allegation has been made that it was the Petitioner who had forged the signatures of Raghuvir Sen and Mangal Sen as Ravishankar and Tejilal. (e) the contention of the Respondent that he came to know of the alleged 24 offence committed in 1966, only in the year 2003 is downright preposterous as the Respondent resided just about two kilometres from away from the land in question and it is impossible that he could have remained oblivious of the fact that the Petitioner and the co- accused persons were in continuous possession of the said land for nearly forty years, having brought the land from the father and uncle of the Respondent. (f) the findings of the revenue authorities that the father and uncle of the Respondent were also know by their aliases of Ravishankar and Tejilal, thus knocking the base out of the Respondent's allegation. (g) there is no report of the state examiner of questioned documents to prima facie establish that the authorship of the signatures of Ravishankar and Tejilal on the question sale deed of 1966 is not attributable to Raghvir Sen and Mangal Sen. (h) The fact that a civil suit is still pending in relation to the same property and the question whether the sale deed of 1966 is genuine is an issue pending adjudication in the civil suit and (i) the right to a speedy trial of the Petitioner has been seriously infracted by the institution of the criminal case against the Petitioner after the passage of forty years from the date of the alleged offence. Thus, the this petition is allowed and the summoning order dated 24-09-2009 passed by the court of 25 learned Judicial Magistrate First Class, Jabalpur passed in Complaint Case No. 11998/09 along with criminal case itself is quashed.
(Atul
Sreedharan )
Judge
PG/ Digitally signed by PARMESHWAR
GOPE
Date: 2018.03.20 16:51:06 +05'30'