Srinivas Reddy Vs the State of Karnataka

THIS WRIT PETITION IS FILED UNDER ARTICLES 226 AND 227 OF THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA PRAYING TO QUASH THE ENTIRE PROCEEDING REGISTERED IN C.C.NO.14745/2018 (CRIME NO.80/2018) UNDER SECTIONS 120(B), 420 AND 34 OF THE INDIAN PENAL CODE, PENDING ON THE FILE OF THE IV ADDITIONAL CHIEF METROPOLITAN MAGISTRATE, BENGALURU, VIDE ANNEXURE-A.

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THIS WRIT PETITION COMING ON FOR PRELIMINARY HEARING IN 'B' GROUP, THIS DAY, ORDER WAS MADE THEREIN AS UNDER:

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NC: 2026:KHC:12661 WP No. 29941 of 2018

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CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE R. NATARAJ

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ORAL ORDER

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The petitioners have challenged the charge sheet filed against them by the respondent No.5 in C.C. No.14745/2018 for the offences punishable under Sections 120B, 420 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (for short, 'the IPC'), which is pending consideration before the II Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Bengaluru. They have also sought for a writ in the nature of mandamus to direct the respondent authorities to enquire into the complaints dated 21.09.2017, 09.10.2017, 21.04.2018 and 23.06.2018/07.05.2018 filed by the petitioner No.1 against respondent Nos.6 and others and to take action in accordance with law.

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2(i). The respondent No.6 and others appear to have entered into an agreement of sale with the petitioner Nos.1 and 2 on 23.12.2015 to purchase 01 Acre 38½ guntas of land in Sy. No.76/1 situate at Gonighattapura Village, Sarjapura Hobli, Anekal Taluk, Bengaluru Urban District, and a contemporaneous power of attorney was purportedly executed by the petitioner Nos.1 to 3 in favour of the respondent No.6

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and Mr. Jawahar Gopal in respect of 01 Acre 38½ guntas of land in Sy. No.76/1 on 23.12.2015. It appears that the petitioner Nos.1 to 3 executed a sale deed dated 18.05.2016 through their power of attorney in favour of respondent No.6 and Mr. Jawahar Gopal and conveyed them the land measuring 01 Acre 38½ guntas in Sy. No.76/1 of Gonighattapura village.

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(ii). It appears that petitioner Nos.1 and 2 executed another agreement of sale dated 23.12.2015 in favour of M/s. Classic Featherlite Waterfront Developers LLP, (for short, 'the Firm'), a limited liability partnership Firm of which respondent No.6 and Mr. Jawahar Gopal are Partners in respect of 03 Acres 07 guntas of land in Sy. No.33 of Gonighattapura Village, Sarjapura Hobli, Anekal Taluk, Bengaluru Urban District, and a contemporaneous power of attorney was executed by the petitioner Nos.1 to 3 in favour of the said Firm in respect of the said 03 Acres 07 guntas of land in Sy. No.33.

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(iii). The respondent No.6 alleged that the accused No.2 / petitioner No.2 and accused No.3 represented to him that they were the absolute owners of the land measuring 02 acres 05 guntas in Sy No.70/1 of Gonighattapura village and that the

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land measuring 03 acres 07 guntas in Sy. No.33 of Gonighattapura village, was bequeathed to the petitioner Nos.2 and accused No.3 under a Will dated 06.01.2010 executed by Sri G.P. Laksmaiah Reddy, father of Smt. Sudha (accused No.2) and father-in-law of Srinivasa Reddy (accused No.3). Subsequently, khatas of the said properties were changed to the names of accused Nos.2 and 3.

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(iv). The respondent No.6 alleged that the accused No.2/ petitioner No.2 and accused No.3 after receipt of the entire sale consideration, have fraudulently executed a release deed dated 14.02.2017 in favour of accused No.5 releasing their rights in respect of the land measuring 03 Acres 05 guntas in Sy. No.33.

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(v). The respondent No.6 further alleged that the accused No.5 / petitioner No.4 colluding with accused Nos.1 to 4 has filed appeal R.A. No.359/2017 on 21.02.2017 challenging the mutation orders passed in favour of her mother and father i.e. accused No.3 and accused No.4 / petitioner No.3 stating that the properties were ancestral in nature and she also had rights over the properties and the said appeal was posted on 20.03.2017 for issuance of notice to other parties. On the very

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same day, accused Nos.2 to 5 filed a compromise petition stating that the properties were ancestral properties and accused No.2 to 4 had no objection for change of khata in favour of accused No.5. The respondent No.6 contended that the property was the self acquired property of the mother of accused Nos.4 and 5 and on the date of compromise, accused Nos.2 and 3 had no right, title or interest over the properties as they had sold the same in the year 2015 itself and had misrepresented to the Court and obtained an order of partition.

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(vi). It is alleged by the respondent No.6 that the petitioner Nos.3 and 4 had fraudulently transferred the said land in Sy. No.76/1 of Gonighattapura village to one Sri Rajashekar @ Rajashekar Munireddy / accused No.3 through a sale deed dated 06.06.2017.

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(vii). In this regard, the respondent No.6 had earlier lodged a complaint against petitioner Nos.1 to 3 and another before the Sarjapura Police Station alleging the commission of an offence punishable under Section 420 of IPC following which Crime No.229/2017 was registered. It appears that even while the said case was pending investigation, the respondent No.6

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filed PCR No.1416/2018 which was referred for investigation under Section 156(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for short, 'Cr.P.C.) to the Station House Officer, Banashankari Police Station, who after registering Crime No.80/2018, took up investigation and filed a charge sheet for the offences punishable under Sections 420 and 120B read with Section 34 of IPC. Copies of the charge sheet were furnished to the petitioners and the Trial Court after perusing the same, took cognizance of the said offences against the petitioners herein and issued process to the petitioners vide order dated 01.06.2018. Being aggrieved by the criminal proceedings initiated against them, the petitioners are before this Court.

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Learned counsel for the petitioners submitted that the respondent No.6 had earlier lodged a complaint against the petitioners herein before the Sarjapura Police Station, who registered Crime No.229/2017. He submits that this complaint was investigated into and a 'B' report was filed which is not questioned by the respondent No.6. However, without disclosing the filing of the earlier complaint before the Sarjapura Police Station, the respondent No.6 filed a private complaint (PCR No.1416/2018) before the Trial Court which

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was referred to the Station House Officer, Banashankari Police Station, for investigation under Section 156(3) of Cr.P.C and the Police after investigation, have filed a charge sheet against the petitioners for the offences punishable under Sections 120B, 420 read with Section 34 of IPC. He, therefore, contends that this is a clear case of abuse of process of law and Courts. He contends that once the initial complaint lodged by the respondent No.6 was concluded by filing a 'B' report, respondent No.6 is not entitled in law to lodge a second complaint on virtually the same facts. In this regard, he invited the attention of this Court to the judgments of the Hon'ble Apex Court in the case of T.T. Antony v. State of Kerala and

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Others [(2001) 6 SCC 181], and in the case of Tarak Dash Mukharjee and Others v. State of Uttar Pradesh and Others [2022 LiveLaw (SC) 731] . He thus contended that the impugned criminal proceedings against the petitioners are liable to be halted. Besides this, he contends that the respondent No.6 has filed a suit in O.S. No.142/2017 before the Civil Court, Anekal in respect of his rights in the land bearing Sy. No.76/1 and therefore, the continuation of the criminal proceedings against the petitioners would be an abuse

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of the process of Courts. He, therefore, prays that the impugned proceedings against the petitioners be halted.

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Per contra, the learned counsel for the respondent No.6 submits that the respondent No.6 had though filed a complaint earlier before the Sarjapura Police Station, the same was transferred to the Cyber, Economic and Narcotics Division, who had filed a 'B' report and a notice of such report was issued to the respondent No.6. He contends that since the 'B' report was filed, the respondent No. 6 felt it expedient to file a private complaint. He contends that the respondent No.5 after investigating the case, had rightly filed a charge sheet against the petitioners for the offences punishable under Sections 120B, 420 read with Section 34 of IPC. He, therefore, submits that this writ petition is misconceived and is liable to be dismissed.

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Learned High Court Government Pleader appearing for respondent Nos.1 to 5, on the other hand, submitted that the respondent No.6 did not disclose about the filing of the first complaint before the Sarjapura Police Station in his private complaint. He, therefore, submits that the respondent No.5 did

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not have any inkling about the prior complaint lodged by the respondent No.6.

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I have considered the submissions made by the learned counsel for the petitioners and the learned High Court Government Pleader appearing for the official respondents and the learned counsel for the respondent No.6.

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The fact that the respondent No.6 had lodged a complaint before the Sarjapura Police Station in respect of the land bearing Sy. No.76/1 is not in dispute. It is also not in dispute that Sarjapura Police Station had registered Crime No.229/2017. The case in Crime No.229/2017 was closed by filing a 'B' report. It is not known whether the respondent No.6 had filed a protest petition after receiving a notice of the filing of the 'B' report. Be that as it may, when the respondent No.6 filed a private complaint, it was incumbent upon him to disclose in the private complaint about the filing of the earlier complaint before the Sarjapura Police Station. A perusal of the entire private complaint shows that there was not even a whisper about the respondent No.6 filing a prior complaint before the Sarjapura Police Station. The respondent No.5 has proceeded

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to investigate the offence in view of the private complaint being referred to it for investigation under Section 156(3) of the Cr.P.C. and thereafter, filed a charge sheet for the offences punishable under Sections 120B, 420 read with Section 34 of IPC, which is presently challenged in this petition.

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The purpose of ensuring that there is no repeated complaints, is underscored by the Hon'ble Apex Court in the case of T.T. Antony (referred supra) , where it held as under:

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"20. From the above discussion it follows that under the scheme of the provisions of Sections 154, 155, 156, 157, 162, 169, 170 and 173 CrPC only the earliest or the first information in regard to the commission of a cognizable offence satisfies the requirements of Section 154 CrPC. Thus there can be no second FIR and consequently there can be no fresh investigation on receipt of every subsequent information in respect of the same cognizable offence or the same occurrence or incident giving rise to one or more cognizable offences. On receipt of information about a cognizable offence or an incident giving rise to a cognizable offence or offences and on entering the FIR in the station house diary, the officer in charge of a police station has to investigate not merely the cognizable offence reported in the FIR but also other connected offences found to have been committed in the course of the same transaction or the same occurrence

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and file one or more reports as provided in Section 173 CrPC.

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xxx

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35. For the aforementioned reasons, the registration of the second FIR under Section 154 CrPC on the basis of the letter of the Director General of Police as Crime No. 268 of 1997 of Kuthuparamba Police Station is not valid and consequently the investigation made pursuant thereto is of no legal consequence, they are accordingly quashed. We hasten to add that this does not preclude the investigating agency from seeking leave of the Court in Crimes Nos. 353 and 354 of 1994 for making further investigations and filing a further report or reports under Section 173(8) CrPC before the competent Magistrate in the said cases. In this view of the matter, we are not inclined to interfere with the judgment of the High Court under challenge insofar as it relates to quashing of Crime No. 268 of 1997 of Kuthuparamba Police Station against the ASP (R.A. Chandrasekhar); in all other aspects the impugned judgment of the High Court shall stand set aside."

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The above position is reiterated by the Hon'ble Apex Court in the case of Tarak Dash Mukharjee referred supra. Therefore, respondent No.6 could not have subverted the law by filing a private complaint against the petitioners without disclosing filing of the earlier complaint before the Sarjapura

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Police Station. If only the respondent No.6 had disclosed such filing of earlier complaint, the Trial Court would not have ventured to refer the private complaint for investigation under Section 156(3) of the Cr.P.C. This is indeed a clear case of abuse of process of law and the Courts. The respondent No.6 after being served with the copy of the 'B' report in the complaint lodged before the Sarjapura Police Station, which was transferred to the Cyber, Economic and Narcotics Cell, he must have been cautious by challenging the 'B' report that was filed. It would have augured well for the respondent No.6 if he had filed a protest petition against the acceptance of the 'B' report in which event, the Court could have exercised jurisdiction to take cognizance for the offences, if any, committed by the petitioners herein. Even otherwise, the allegations made in the private complaint give an impression that a civil dispute is given a criminal angle thereby abusing the process of law.

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In view of the fact that the respondent No.6 is already before the Civil Court i.e. Court of Senior Civil Judge and JMFC., Anekal in O.S. No.142/2017, it is not worthwhile to proceed with the prosecution of the petitioners in C.C.

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No.14745/2018 pending trial before the II Additional Metropolitan Magistrate, Bengaluru, for the offences punishable under Sections 120B, 420 read with Section 34 of the IPC. Hence, the following :

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ORDER

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i. The petition is allowed.

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ii. The impugned prosecution of the petitioners,

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who are accused Nos.1, 2, 4 and 5 respectively, in C.C. No.14745/2018 registered for the offences punishable under Sections 120B, 420 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 pending trial before the II Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Bengaluru, is quashed.

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Sd/(R. NATARAJ) JUDGE

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SMA/List No.: 1 Sl No.: 47

Srinivas Reddy v. the State of Karnataka

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Srinivas Reddy v. the State of Karnataka

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