Proddaturi Shobha Rani Shobha Rani, ... vs S.H.O., Dharmavaram Town P.S., ... on 24 January, 2020
5. Secondly, learned counsel would argue that even assuming for
argument sake that the petitioners are active partners in the
partnership firm of the accused, nevertheless, the criminal complaint
is not maintainable against the individual partners i.e., A1 to A5
without arraying partnership firm as one of the accused.
In-expatiation he would submit, as per complaint averments, A1 took
sarees on credit on behalf of their partnership firm viz.,
M/s.P. Neelakantam and Sons. In that view, if at all any offence is
committed, that should be attributable at the first instance to the
partnership firm and then only to the individual partners who are in
active participation of the firm's business. Learned counsel
strenuously argued that there can be no vicarious liability under
criminal law. Therefore, leaving firm, the complainant cannot file
criminal case against the individual partners even assuming that they
1
(2002) 7 SCC 655
UDPR,J
Crl.P.No.11825 of 2014
4
have, in the course of the firm's business committed the offence. He
would thus argue that the criminal case is not legally maintainable
against the partners without showing the firm as party/accused. On
this legal point, he relied upon Aneeta Hada vs. Godfather Travels
and Tours (P) Limited2, N. Elangovan vs. C. Ganesan3 and
Rangabashyam vs. Ramesh4.