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4. The learned Counsel for the respondent, on the other hand, would submit that there can be no quarrel with the legal proposition and that the matter be remitted to the court below in order that the proper procedure be followed and action be taken in due course.

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5. In the light of these rival contentions, the question to be considered is, whether the proceedings are vitiated on account of the legal bar as contended by the learned Counsel for the petitioner. The apex court in the case of Iqbal Singh Marwah and another vs. Meenakshi Marwah and another, (2005) 4 SCC 370, was dealing with a reference in view of difference of opinion as to whether or not the bar under section 196 would apply in a given case. The facts were that the appellants, who were real brothers of Mukhtar Singh Marwah and the respondents were his widow and son respectively to the said Marwah. Mukhtar Singh Marwah died on 3.6.1993. Appellant no.1 had filed a probate case in No.363/1993 in the Court of the District Judge, Delhi for being granted the probate of the will allegedly executed by Marwah on 20.1.1993. The petition was contested on the ground that the will was forged. On their application, appellant no.1 filed the original will in the Court of the District Judge on 10.2.1994. Thereafter, the respondents moved an application under section 340 of the Cr.P.C requesting the court to file a criminal complaint against the appellant no.1 as the will set up by him was forged. A reply to the said application was filed on 27.7.1994 but the application was not disposed of. Thereafter, the respondents filed a criminal complaint in May 1996 in the Court of the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, New Delhi for prosecution of the appellants and their mother under sections 192, 193, 463, 464, 465, 467, 469, 471, 499 and 500 IPC on the ground that the will set up by the appellants was forged and fictitious document. It was stated in the complaint that though Mukhtar Singh Marwah was an educated man, but the will bears his thumb impression. He had accounts in Bank of Tokyo and Standard Chartered Bank which he used to operate by putting his signature. Under the will he had completely divested the respondents, who were his widow and son, respectively, and also daughter and had bequeathed his entire property to his mother and after her death, to his brothers and sisters. The Magistrate held that the question whether the will was a genuine document or a forged one, was an issue before the District Judge in the probate proceedings where the will had been filed, Sections 195(1)(b)(i) and (ii) Cr.P.C operated as a bar for taking cognizance of the offences under the above said Sections. The complaint was accordingly dismissed. The respondents thereafter filed a criminal revision against the order of the learned Magistrate before the Sessions Judge who relied on Sachida Nand Singh vs. State of Bihar, (1998) 2 SCC 493, and held that the bar contained in Section 195(1)(b)(ii) Cr.PC would not apply where forgery of a document was committed before the said document was produced in court. The revision petition was accordingly allowed, and the matter was remanded to the Court of the Magistrate for proceeding in accordance with law. The appellants challenged the same by filing a petition under section 482 of the CR.P.C before the High Court and the same was dismissed on 15.9.2000 following the law laid down in Sachida Nand, supra. Feeling aggrieved, the appellants had approached the apex court the apex court held that the principal controversy revolves round the interpretation of the expression "when such offence is allged to have been committed in respect of a document produced or given in evidence in a proceeding in any court" occurring in clause

(b)(ii) of sub-section (1) of Section 195 Cr.PC. and the reliance placed on the observations in part -10 of Surjit Singh vs. Balbir Singh, (1996) 3 SCC 533 is opposed to what was laid down in Sachida Nand, supra which did not refer to Sachida Nand, supra, and finally concluded that in view of the discussion that the law laid down in Sachida Nand, supra, has correctly decided that it was the correct view. In Sachida Nand, supra, it was held that the scope of preliminary inquiry envisaged in Section 340(1) of the Code is to ascertain whether any offence affecting administration of justice has been committed in respect of a document produced in court or given in evidence in a proceeding in that court. In other words, the offence should have been committed during the time when the document was in custodia legis. It would be a strained thinking that any offence involving forgery of a document if committed far outside the precincts of the court and long before its production in the court, could also be treated as one affecting administration of justice merely because that document later reached the court records.

The sequitur of the above discussion is that the bar contained in Section 195(1)(b)(ii) of the Code is not applicable to a case where forgery of the document was committed before the document was produced in a court.

6. In view of the law laid down as above, in the present case on hand, the document produced in court on the basis of which the case has been disposed of would be clearly an offence punishable under Section 192 of the IPC in which view, the bar under section 195(1)(b)(ii) of the code would be applicable and therefore, it was for the procedure prescribed under section 340 to have been followed before there could be any prosecution of the accused. Hence, in the light of the case having been entertained against the petitioner in respect an offence which was punishable under section 192 of the IPC, it was necessary for the court to have followed the procedure prescribed in law. Hence, the entertainment of the private complaint and the registration of a case in that view of the matter was bad in law.