Single Judge quashed the quashing application under s. 482 Cr.P.C. held that the summoning order is valid as material on record showed sufficient ground for proceeding and the scope of Magistrate inquiry is limited to prima facie case.
Application under s. 482 Cr.P.C. dismissed; summoning order upheld.
This page shows the compact analysis of this judgement. The full analysis — procedural history, issue-by-issue holdings with ratio and obiter, advocates, and paragraph-level evidence for every claim — is being added to the record in batches and will appear here when this judgement has been through it.
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AFR
Court No. - 84
Case :- APPLICATION U/S 482 No. - 6826 of 2021
Applicant :- Sanjay Singh And Another Opposite Party :- State of U.P. and Another Counsel for Applicant :- Gajala Srivastava,Manish Counsel for Opposite Party :- G.A.
Hon'ble Dr. Yogendra Kumar Srivastava,J.
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by the applicants.
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“200. Examination of complainant. — A Magistrate taking cognizance of an offence on complaint shall examine upon oath the complainant and the witnesses present, if any, and the substance of such examination shall be reduced to writing and shall be signed by the complainant and the witnesses, and also by the Magistrate:
Provided that, when the complaint is made in writing, the Magistrate need not examine the complainant and the witnesses—
Provided further that if the Magistrate makes over the case to another Magistrate under section 192 after examining the complainant and the witnesses, the latter Magistrate need not re- examine them.
202. Postponement of issue of process. —(1) Any Magistrate, on receipt of a complaint of an offence of which he is authorised to take cognizance or which has been made over to him under section 192, may, if he thinks fit [and shall, in a case where the accused is residing at a place beyond the area in which he exercises his jurisdiction] postpone the issue of process against the accused, and either inquire into the case himself or direct an investigation to be made by a police officer or by such other person as he thinks fit, for the purpose of deciding whether or not there is sufficient ground for proceeding:
Provided that no such direction for investigation shall be made—
(2) In an inquiry under sub- section (1), the Magistrate may, if he thinks fit, take evidence of witnesses on oath: Provided that if it appears to the Magistrate that the offence complained of is triable exclusively by the Court of Session, he shall call upon the complainant to produce all
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his witnesses and examine them on oath.
(3) If an investigation under sub- section (1) is made by a person not being a police officer, he shall have for that investigation all the powers conferred by this Code on an officer- in- charge of a police station except the power to arrest without warrant.
204. Issue of process. —(1)If in the opinion of a Magistrate taking cognizance of an offence there is sufficient ground for proceeding, and the case appears to be—
(a) a summons- case, he shall issue his summons for the attendance of the accused, or
(b) a warrant- case, he may issue a warrant, or, if he thinks fit, a summons, for causing the accused to be brought or to appear at a certain time before such Magistrate or (if he has no jurisdiction himself) some other Magistrate having jurisdiction.
(2) No summons or warrant shall be issued against the accused under sub- section (1) until a list of the prosecution witnesses has been filed.
(3) In a proceeding instituted upon a complaint made in writing every summons or warrant issued under subsection (1) shall be accompanied by a copy of such complaint.
(4) When by any law for the time being in force any process- fees or other fees are payable, no process shall be issued until the fees are paid and, if such fees are not paid within a reasonable time, the Magistrate may dismiss the complaint.
(5) Nothing in this section shall be deemed to affect the provisions of section 87.”
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prima facie case against the person accused of the offence in the complaint, and to prevent the issue of process on a complaint which is either false or vexatious or intended only to harass such person.
2 (2002) 1 SCC 241
3 (1973) 3 SCC 753
4 1964 (1) SCR 639
5 (1976) 3 SCC 736
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inquiry under section 202 is limited only to the ascertainment of the truth or falsehood of the allegations made in the complaint (i) on the material placed by the complainant before the court; (ii) for the limited purpose of finding out whether a prima facie case for issue of process has been made out; (iii) for deciding the question purely from the point of view of the complainant without at all adverting to any defence that the accused may have. The observations made in the judgment in this regard are as follows:
“15. In case of a complaint under Section 200 Cr.P.C. or IPC a Magistrate can take cognizance of the offence made out and then has to examine the complainant and his witnesses, if any, to ascertain whether a prima facie case is made out against the accused to issue process so that the issue of process is prevented on a complaint which is either false or vexatious or intended only to harass. Such examination is provided in order to find out whether there is or not sufficient ground for proceeding. The words “sufficient ground”, used under Section 203 have to be construed to mean the satisfaction that a prima facie case is made out against the accused and not sufficient ground for the purpose of conviction.
"The section does not say that a regular trial of adjudging truth or otherwise of the person complained against should take place at that stage, for, such a person can be called upon to answer the accusation made against him only when a process has been issued and he is on trial. Section 203 consists of two parts. The first part lays down the materials which the Magistrate must consider, and the second part says that if after considering those materials there is in his judgment no sufficient ground for proceeding, he may dismiss the complaint. In Chandra Deo Singh v. Prokash Chandra Bose, [1964] 1 SCR 639, where dismissal of a complaint by the Magistrate at the
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stage of Section 202 inquiry was set aside, this Court laid down that the test was whether there was sufficient ground for proceeding and not whether there was sufficient ground for conviction, and observed (p. 653) that where there was prima facie evidence, even though the person charged of an offence in the complaint might have a defence, the matter had to be left to be decided by the appropriate forum at the appropriate stage and issue of a process could not be refused. Unless, therefore, the Magistrate finds that the evidence led before him is selfcontradictory, or intrinsically untrustworthy, process cannot be refused if that evidence makes out a prima facie case."
"where the allegations made in the complaint or the statements of the witnesses recorded in support of the same taken at their face value make out absolutely no case against the accused or the complaint does not disclose the essential ingredients of an offence which is alleged against the accused."(SCC p. 741, para 5).”
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distinguished from the actual evidence produced during trial, the test to be applied at the stage was whether the material placed before the Magistrate was “sufficient for proceeding against the accused” and not “sufficient to prove and establish the guilt”. Referring to the earlier authorities on the point it was observed as follows :
“37. The criterion which need to be kept in mind by a Magistrate issuing process, have been repeatedly delineated by this Court. I shall therefore, first examine the declared position of law on the subject. Reference in this behalf may be made to the decision rendered by this Court in Chandra Deo Singh vs. Prokash Chandra Bose, AIR 1963 SC 1430, wherein it was observed as under : (AIR p. 1433, para 8)
“(8) Coming to the second ground, we have no hesitation is holding that the test propounded by the learned single judge of the High Court is wholly wrong. For determining the question whether any process is to be issued or not, what the Magistrate has to be satisfied is whether there is 'sufficient ground for proceeding' and not whether there is sufficient ground for conviction. Whether the evidence is adequate for supporting the conviction can be determined only at the trial and not at the stage of enquiry . A number of decisions were cited at the bar in which the question of the scope of the enquiry under Section 202 has been considered. Amongst those decisions are : Parmanand Brahmachari v. Emperor, AIR 1930 Pat 30; Radha Kishun Sao v. S.K. Misra, AIR 1949 Pat 36; Ramkisto Sahu v. State of Bihar, AIR 1952 Pat 125; Emperor v. J.A. Finan, AIR 1931 Bom 524 and Baidya Nath Singh v. Muspratt, ILR (1887) 14 Cal 141. In all these cases, it has been held that the object of the provisions of Section 202 is to enable the Magistrate to form an opinion as to whether process should be issued or not and to remove from his mind any hesitation that he may have felt upon the mere perusal of the complaint and the consideration of the complainant’s evidence on oath. The courts have also pointed out in these cases that what the Magistrate has to see is whether there is
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evidence in support of the allegations of the complainant and not whether the evidence is sufficient to warrant a conviction. The learned Judges in some of these cases have been at pains to observe that an enquiry under Section 202 is not to be likened to a trial which can only take place after process is issued, and that there can be only one trial. No doubt, as stated in sub-section (1) of Section 202 itself, the object of the enquiry is to ascertain the truth or falsehood of the complaint, but the Magistrate making the enquiry has to do this only with reference to the intrinsic quality of the statements made before him at the enquiry which would naturally mean the complaint itself, the statement on oath made by the complainant and the statements made before him by persons examined at the instance of the complainant .” (emphasis supplied).
xxx
“(10) The contention urged is that though the trial court was directed to consider the entire material on record including the final report before deciding whether the process should be issued against the appellant or not, yet the entire material was not considered. From perusal of order passed by the Magistrate it cannot be said that the entire material was not taken into consideration. The order passed by the Magistrate taking cognizance is a well-written order. The order not only refers to the statements recorded by the police during investigation which led to the filing of final report by the police and the statements of witnesses recorded by the Magistrate under Sections 200 and 202 of the Code but also sets out with clarity the principles required to be kept in mind at the stage of taking cognizance and reaching a prima facie view. At this stage, the Magistrate had only to decide whether sufficient ground exists or not for further proceeding in the matter. It is well settled that notwithstanding the opinion of the police, a Magistrate is empowered to take cognizance if the material on record makes out a case for the said
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purpose. The investigation is the exclusive domain of the police. The taking of cognizance of the offence is an area exclusively within the domain of a Magistrate. At this stage, the Magistrate has to be satisfied whether there is sufficient ground for proceeding and not whether there is sufficient ground for conviction. Whether the evidence is adequate for supporting the conviction, can be determined only at the trial and not at the stage of inquiry. At the stage of issuing the process to the accused, the Magistrate is not required to record reasons. (Chief Controller of Imports and Exports v. Roshanlal Agarwal)”
(emphasis supplied)
All along having made a reference to the words "there is sufficient ground to proceed" it has been held by this Court, that for the purpose of issuing process, all that the concerned Court has to determine is, whether the material placed before it "is sufficient for proceeding against the accused"? The observations recorded by this Court extracted above, further enunciate, that the term "sufficient to proceed" is different and distinct from the term "sufficient to prove and established guilt".
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recorded by the magistrate taking cognizance of the offence is that there is sufficient ground for proceeding against the accused, the order passed by the court below summoning the applicants does not suffer from any infirmity, so as to call for interference.
(Dr. Y.K. Srivastava, J.)
3 issues framed by the court
Whether the summoning order under s. 482 Cr.P.C. is liable to be quashed for lack of sufficient ground for proceeding.
Whether the scope of inquiry under sections 200, 202 and 204 Cr.P.C. requires the Magistrate to decide sufficiency for conviction.
Whether contradictions between the s. 200 statement and the complaint vitiate the primacy case.
Colour shows how this judgement treated each authority
S.W. Palanitkar and Others v. State of Bihar and AnotherFollowed¶41
(2002) 1 SCC 241 · Who else cites this
Nirmaljit Singh Hoon v. State of West Bengal and AnotherFollowed¶41
(1973) 3 SCC 753 · Who else cites this
Chandra Deo Singh v. Prokash Chandra BoseFollowed¶41
[1964] 1 SCR 639 · Who else cites this
Smt. Nagawwa v. Veeranna Shivalingappa Konjalgi and OthersFollowed¶41
(1976) 3 SCC 736 · Who else cites this
Nupur Talwar v. Central Bureau of Investigation and AnotherFollowed¶55
(2012) 11 SCC 465 · Who else cites this
Jagdish Ram vs. State of Rajasthan and Anr.Followed¶64
(2004) 4 SCC 432 · Who else cites this
3 provisions across 3 enactments
Sanjay Singh and Another
Yogendra Kumar Srivastava
As recorded by the court registry
Judgements on the same questions, provisions and authorities, from every court
