Dismissed

Dipinder Singh Brar and Anr. v. State of Punjab and Anr.

Punjab & Haryana HC24 May 2013CRM-M/7415/2012

Case brief

AI extract

What is this about?

The court dismissed petitions seeking quashing of an FIR registered for cheating and forgery relating to disputed wills and property mutation. The court held that the allegations were not absurd and did not merely cloak a civil dispute, given the factual disputes regarding birth, death, and nationality of heirs.

What did the court decide?

The petitions seeking quashing of the FIR were dismissed as they had no merit; the FIR could not be held to be an abuse of process of the court.

Dipinder Singh Brar and Anr. Vs State of… — Succession and Inheritance | Punjab & Haryana HC (2013)

¶1

Crl. Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 & Crl. Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012

¶2

¶3

IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH

¶4

1. Criminal Misc. No. M-7415 of 2012 (O&M) Date of Decision : May 24^th , 2013

¶5

Dipinder Singh Brar and another

¶6

.... Petitioners Versus

¶7

State of Punjab and another

¶8

.... Respondents

¶9

2 Criminal Misc. No. M-40237 of 2012 (O&M) Pradeep Bhanot .... Petitioner Versus

¶10

State of Punjab and another

¶11

.... Respondents

¶12

CORAM : HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE VIJENDER SINGH MALIK

¶13

1.Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment?

¶14

2.Whether to be referred to the Reporters or not?

¶15

3.Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest?

¶16

Present Mr. P.S.Hundal, Senior Advocate, with Mr. Manu Loona, Advocate, for the petitioners.

¶17

Mr. Amit Chaudhary, D. A.G., Punjab, for the State.

¶18

Mr. Vikram Chaudhari, Advocate, for respondent No.2.

¶19

VIJENDER SINGH MALIK, J.

¶20

FIR No.64 dated 26.05.2010 [Annexure P1] registered at Police Station Ajnala, District Amritsar for an offence punishable under sections 420, 467, 468, 471 read with section 120-B of Indian Penal

¶21

Crl. Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 & Crl. Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012

¶22

¶23

Code alongwith all subsequent proceedings arising therein, are sought to be quashed by Dipinder Singh Brar and Amita Brar by way of Criminal Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 and Pradeep Bhanot by way of Criminal Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012. The case bearing FIR No. 64 has been got registered by Anishya Hardas wife of R.S.Hardas who happens to be the sister of Pradeep Bhanot and Amita Brar. Dipinder Brar, the petitioner is husband of said Amita Brar. The case has been lodged by Anishya Hardas [hereinafter referred to as “the complainant”] against Pradeep Bhanot, Amita Brar, Dipinder Singh Brar, Satpal, Paramjit Singh, M.D. Mamgain and Manjit Singh, Lamberdar. The case, put briefly, as projected by the complainant in her FIR, is as under:

¶24

The complainant is a daughter of Sh. Sadanand Bhanot, IAS, who retired as Financial Commissioner and has now died. Pradeep Bhanot and Amita Brar are her brother and sister respectively. Accused No. 3 is her brother-in-law. Accused No. 4 and 5 are the witnesses of the fabricated Will and accused No. 3 and 6 are the witnesses of fabricated Will of Sadanand Bhanot while accused No. 7 is a witness who falsely made wrong assertions before the revenue officer.

¶25

Will of Dayawanti dated 3.12.1990 propounded by accused No. 1 to 5 was fabricated by them in collusion and connivance with each other. They have asserted in the Will that Dayawanti is issueless whereas the judgment passed by the civil court at Ambala proves that Dayawanti had four issues out of which one was son named Anil Banerji. Accused No. 1 to 3 fabricated even death certificates of Shanti, Leela and Amriti, the sisters of father of Sadanand Bhanot showing them to be

¶26

Crl. Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 & Crl. Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012

¶27

¶28

residents of Mohali [India]. The complainant has claimed that they were Pakistani nationals and died there in Pakistan. By preparing fabricated death certificates filed before the revenue officers alongwith false affidavits, they have got the mutation sanctioned of the property of the complainant.

¶29

Accused Nos. 1 to 3 in collusion and connivance with accused No.6 again fabricated a Will of Sadanand Bhanot on 3.1.1985 just few hours before his death. All these documents were kept secret for about 22-25 years by the accused. After passage of this time, they presented these fabricated documents for the purpose of grabbing the property of the complainant. The revenue officials were also aware of the true facts. They for monetary gain sanctioned mutations at the back of the complainant despite protest by the villagers. The complainant came to know of this and applied for cancellation of mutation before Deputy Commissioner-cum-Collector and thereafter made a complaint to Senior Superintendent of Police (Rural) for registration of FIR. The application was sent to Station House Officer for enquiry, but he kept sleeping in the matter. The matter was then brought to the notice of D.S.P. Tilak Raj who too did nothing. He had just sent a police constable to Ambala to record the statement of son of Dayawanti on 2.4.2010. Complainant accompanied him. Anil has repeatedly claimed that his mother did not execute any Will and it is a fabricated Will. Nothing despite it has come out. On the other hand, pressure was being brought upon the complainant to compromise the matter.

¶30

Learned senior counsel for the petitioners has drawn attention

¶31

Crl. Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 & Crl. Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012

¶32

¶33

of the court to Annexure P2, a communication from Sub Registrar, U.T., Chandigarh to Senior Superintendent of Police, Amritsar [Rural]. The communication is given the subject 'Genuineness of Will”. According to him, this document clearly declares that the Will executed by Shri Sadanand Bhanot was registered at Sr. No. 1734, Book No. 3, dated 2.1.1985 and is a genuine document. He has submitted that this document itself proves the genuineness of the Will executed by S.N.Bhanot. According to him, mutation of inheritance of Dayawanti has been sanctioned by Assistant Collector Ist Grade, Ajnala in favour of Pradeep Bhanot. According to him, Dayawanti died issueless because Anil and others are the children of husband of Dayawanti from his previous wife.

¶34

Learned senior counsel for the petitioners has further submitted that no order has been obtained from the civil court to the effect that the Wills are forged. According to him, no opinion of the expert has been obtained to the effect that the Wills were not executed by S.N.Bhanot and Dayawanti. He has further submitted that all the offences relating to Will are non-cognizable as per schedule 1 to Code of Criminal Procedure. He has further submitted that civil suit regarding the Wills is still pending.

¶35

Learned senior counsel for the petitioners has further submitted that Leelawati, Shanti and Amriti, the three sisters of Dayawanti had migrated to India and did not die in Pakistan. According to him, the deaths of these three women was recorded in the records of Additional District Registrar, Births and Deaths Roopnagar, but as on creation of Mohali as a district, the said record has been sent to Mohali. So, the

¶36

Crl. Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 & Crl. Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012

¶37

¶38

record could not be found at Roopnagar. According to him, this, however, would not mean that these three women did not migrate to India.

¶39

Learned senior counsel for the petitioners has further submitted that this is a dispute of civil nature. According to him, growing tendency of complainants attempting to give the cloak of a criminal offence to matters which are essentially and purely civil in nature, has been noticed. According to him, this is done with the obvious purpose of applying pressure on the accused or out of enmity towards the accused, with a view to harass him. He has cited before me a decision of Hon`ble Supreme Court of India in Md. Ibrahim & Ors. Vs. State of Bihar & Anr. 2009 (4) R.C.R. (Criminal) 369, where this tendency is noticed. He has cited another case reported as Joseph Salvarj A. Vs. State of Gujarat and others (2011) 7 SCC 59 . It has been laid down in this case that filing of charge sheet and framing of charge would not debar the High Court from entertaining the quashing proceedings of an FIR.

¶40

Learned counsel for the complainant has submitted on the other hand that the offence of forgery of Will may be non-cognizable, but the offences punishable under sections 420 and 471 IPC of cheating and using forged document as genuine are cognizable offences. According to him, S.N.Bhanot died on 5.1.1985. According to him, the Will comes about on 3.1.1985. According to him, strange enough is the certificate Annexure P2 which mentions that the Will has been registered on 2.1.985. According to him, a Will which was executed on 3.1.1985 could never be registered on 2.1.1985 and it shows that the Will is not genuine.

¶41

Crl. Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 & Crl. Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012

¶42

¶43

Learned counsel for the complainant has further submitted that regarding the unregistered Will of Dayawanti, a civil suit was filed by the heirs of Dayawanti. According to him, Pradeep Bhanot and Amita Brar had sworn an affidavit [Annexure R-2/4] on 29.7.2008 to the effect that Dayawanti wife of C.K.Banerjee died on 14.2.2005 and was issueless and had left behind a Will dated 3.12.1990. According to him, this is a case with disputed facts and when the facts are disputed, the FIR cannot be quashed.

¶44

Learned counsel for the complainant has further submitted that since challan has been filed in the court and the charge has been framed, the High Court is left with no power to quash the FIR. According to him, now, the remedy open to the petitioners is to challenge the charge by way of revision. In this regard, he sought support from a decision of Hon`ble Supreme Court of India in State of Bihar and another Vs. P.P.Sharma, IAS and another 1992 Supp. (1) S.C.C. 222.

¶45

There are two Wills involved in this case. One is the Will of Dayawanti dated 3.12.1990 where it is mentioned that Dayawanti was issueless. This fact is said to be a disputed fact in this case. Dayawanti is said to have left a son and daughters. While the respondentcomplainant claims that Anil Banerji and others were the son and daughters of Dayawanti, the petitioners claim that they were sons of her husband from his previous wife. This is one of the disputed facts involved in this case.

¶46

The other Will is dated 3.1.1985. To prove this to be a genuine document, learned senior counsel for the petitioners has taken

¶47

Crl. Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 & Crl. Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012

¶48

¶49

help of the document, Annexure P2, a communication received from Sub Registrar, U.T. Chandigarh to Senior Superintendent of Police [Rural] . It is strange to note that this document shows the Will to have been registered on 2.1.1985. If it was a Will executed on 3.1.1985 it could not be registered on 2.1.1985. Moreover, a Registrar of documents cannot assert about the genuineness of the Will. He can only certify that the document has been duly registered in his registers.

¶50

Both these Wills are said to have been kept secret for more than 20 years and thereafter they had been given to the revenue authorities for sanctioning of mutations. It is the argument of learned senior counsel for the petitioners that the offences relating to forgery of Wills are non-cognizable offences. It is true that section 467 IPC relating to forgery of valuable securities or Wills is non-cognizable, yet this is not the only offence alleged to have been committed in the course of the transaction. Wills have been used to get mutations sanctioned and these allegations prima facie attract section 471 IPC, which is a cognizable offence.

¶51

The other facts are also there which appear to be disputed facts. There were three other sisters of Dayawanti, named, Shanti, Leela and Amriti. The dispute is on the question as to whether they died in Pakistan before partition or had migrated to India on partition of the country and had died in India. Claiming that they had migrated to India and they have died in the area covered earlier under Roopnagar district and now under Mohali district, benefit is sought to be claimed in the matter of succession. On the other hand, the complainant has claimed

¶52

Crl. Misc. No.M-7415 of 2012 & Crl. Misc. No.M-40237 of 2012

¶53

¶54

that they died in the area now forming part of Pakistan and they never migrated to India.

¶55

For the aforesaid reasons, I cannot agree with learned counsel for the petitioners that this is a dispute of civil nature. One of the heirs of Mr. S.N. Bhanot was shocked to come to know of the Wills of S.N.Bhanot and Smt. Dayawanti after a long lapse of time and she lodged a report. The report, in the circumstances of this case, cannot be said to be an attempt by the complainant to give the cloak of a criminal offence to a matter which has been essentially and purely civil in nature. In these circumstances, I am of the opinion that the facts of this case cannot be said to be such which do not disclose a cognizable offence. The allegations are, moreover, not absurd or unbelievable. The submissions made by learned counsel for the petitioners are disputed facts which have to be examined and determined by learned trial court after taking evidence. In these circumstances, the decisions in Md. Ibrahim and Joseph Salvarj A.'s case (supra) have no application to the facts of this case.

¶56

Consequently, I come to the conclusion that the FIR in question cannot be held to be an abuse of the process of the court. The same cannot, consequently, be quashed. The petitions seeking quashing of the FIR are, therefore, found to have no merit and they are dismissed as such.

¶57

(VIJENDER SINGH MALIK) JUDGE

¶58

May 24^th , 2013 som

Dipinder Singh Brar and Anr. v. State of Punjab and Anr.

Case brief

What is this about?

What did the court decide?

Dipinder Singh Brar and Anr. v. State of Punjab and Anr.

Case brief

What is this about?

What did the court decide?

What the court decided

A compact analysis

Issues for consideration

Cases cited

Statutes considered

Parties & counsel

Coram

Case details

Similar cases

Jarnail Kaur Vs State of Punjab and Ors.

Arshdeep Singh Vs State of Punjab and Ors.

Hasan Khan Vs Union of India & Ors.

Amrik Singh and Ors. Vs State of Punjab and etc.

Secretary Deptt of Education (Schools) Chd Administration and Ors. Vs Arpana Mahajan and Ors.

Pawan Kumar and Ors. Vs State of Haryana and Ors.