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i)The cheque shall be presented to the bank within a period of six months;
ii) After dishonor, a statutory demand shall be made within 15 days; and
iii) The drawer failed to make the payment within 15 days from the date of receipt of the said notice of demand.
(b) The explanation appended to the Section would indicate the debt or liability mentioned in Section 138 of the Act shall be a legally enforceable debt or other liability. By adding this Explanation to the Section, it is clear that issuance of cheque for the discharge of a mere debt or liability, which is not a legally enforceable debt or liability, would not attract the penal Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act. In order words, if the ingredients, namely, the legally enforceable debt is absent, then there could be no prosecution under the Act. Therefore, the prosecution ought to establish that the cheque was issued towards the discharge of the debt, which is enforceable and that too, legally enforceable. Unless these parameters are satisfied, the complaint shall not be entertained by the criminal Court.
(c) Though the word 'legally enforceable debt' is not mentioned in the main Section, it would be clear that a debt or liability shall be legally enforceable, when it is read along with the Explanation.
(d) The Apex Court, in Sundaram Pillai v. Pattabiraman , while interpreting the word Explanation as contained in Section 10(2) of the Tamil Nude Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act, would hold that the object of an Explanation to a statutory provision is to explain. the meaning and intendment of the Act itself, to clarify the same so as to make it consistent with the dominant object which it seems to sub serve, to provide additional support to the dominant object of the Act in order to make it meaningful and purposeful and to advance the object of the Act it can help or assist the Court in interpreting the true purport and intendment of the Act.
(g) Though the Explanation appended to Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act makes it obligatory that the debt or other liability means legally enforceable debt or other liability. Once the insolvency proceedings have commenced, the enforcement of debt is subject to the Provincial Insolvency Act, which the petitioner invoked before the competent Court. Once the enforceability of the debt has been covered for the relief in the Insolvency Proceedings with a prayer for adjudication, the complainant cannot have any independent cause of action outside the scope of the Insolvency Act, since it cannot be said that the debt is a enforceable debt and that too, legally enforceable.

25. The only point urged in this case is that the moment the accused approached the Insolvency Court, the debt becomes unenforceable debt. This contention totally lacks substance because it is not denied that on the date of issuance of cheque dated 18-5-98, the cheque was issued to the complainant for the purpose of discharging the existing liability, which is the crux of the complaint.

26. Thus, when there are averments in the complaint that the cheque was issued by the accused for the discharge of the amount due from the accused to the complainant, then it would be relevant for the trial Court to examine the allegation that there is a debt or liability as to whether the cheque was drawn for discharge of legally enforceable debt or liability on the date of issue of the cheque.