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Shri Sonam Topgay Bhutia vs. Shri Chander Pal and Another

(g) Records of proceedings of Crl. Case No.32 of 2013 pertaining to the application under Section 340 Cr.P.C. which contained order dated 29-11- 2013 dismissing the application under Section 340 Cr.P.C.;

(h) Application under the RTI Act submitted to the Director, Postal Services, Raj Bhawan, P.O. Gangtok dated 14-05-2013.

(iv) The order dated 29-11-2013 dismissing the application under Section 340 Cr.P.C., would show that the Principal District Judge had proceeded on the premise that the Petitioner's case was that the Respondent No.1 had also received the arbitral award on 12-07-2011 when the Petitioner had himself received it. The case of the Petitioner was that apart from the fact that there is no such pleading in his application filed under Section 340 Cr.P.C., the very sworn statement of the Respondent No.1 in his supplementary affidavit that he had received the award on 20-07-2011, was false as revealed from the information received from the Director, Postal Services, Sikkim State, Gangtok. In passing the order dated 29- 11-2013, the Principal District Judge appears to have completely overlooked this aspect and was misled into directing her attention to the correctness of the assertion of the Petitioner that he had received the award on 12-07-2011 and, that as the Petitioner had failed to establish this, it was concluded that no case of Shri Sonam Topgay Bhutia vs. Shri Chander Pal and Another deliberate falsehood was prima facie made out against the the Respondent No.1 on the charge thereby resulting in the dismissal of the application.

(v) It was as a consequence of such dismissal that led the Respondent No.1 to institute the proceeding under Section 500 IPC against the Petitioner for allegedly having defamed him.

(vi) It would appear from the order dated 29-11- 2013 dismissing application under Section 340 Cr.P.C., that there is no finding at all as to whether or not the statement in paragraph 4 affirmed by the Respondent No.1 that he had received the arbitral award on 20-07- 2011, was false. Thus, the allegation remains unaltered and factually correct in view of the information furnished by the Director, Postal Services, Sikkim State, Gangtok. Therefore, even though the application under Section 340 Cr.P.C. was dismissed albeit on an erroneous premise for the reasons aforesaid, no case under Sections 499/500 IPC can be said to have been made out against the Petitioner.

28. The other aspect of the case that adds to its special feature is that the present complaint appears to be a counter-blast to the Petitioner having filed the application under Section 340 Cr.P.C. The records of the case, as discussed earlier, would reveal that as soon as the application under Section 340 Cr.P.C. filed by the Petitioner registered as Crl. Misc. Case No.32 of 2013, was dismissed vide order dated 29-11-2013, the Shri Sonam Topgay Bhutia vs. Shri Chander Pal and Another Respondent No.1 on the very day had filed an application under Section 250 read with Section 357 Cr.P.C. registered as Crl. Misc. Case No.1 of 2013 (Crl. Misc. Case No.55A of 2013) against the Petitioner seeking compensation for the accusation made against him. When this application was dismissed, the Respondent No.1 had preferred a revision in this Court being Crl.Rev.P. No.14 of 2014 but, that was also dismissed by order dated 25-11-2014. The Respondent No.1 then filed the present complaint being Private Complaint Case No.06 of 2014 before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, East and North Sikkim at Gangtok. The relentlessness in the manner in which proceedings were initiated against the Petitioner would lead one to reasonably conclude that those as well as the present proceeding have been preferred with the oblique purpose of seeking retribution against the Petitioner.