words per minute
13
AkhilDubey
00:00
Speed
The jurisdiction under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure has to be exercised with care. In the exercise of its jurisdiction, a High Court can examine whether a matter which is essentially of a civil nature has been given a cloak of a criminal offence. Where the ingredients required to constitute a criminal offence are not made out from a bare reading of the complaint, the continuation of the criminal proceeding will constitute an abuse of the process of the court. In the present case, the son of the appellants has instituted a civil suit for the recovery of money against the first respondent. The suit is pending. The first respondent has filed the complaint against the appellants six years after the date of the alleged transaction and nearly three years from the filing of the suit. The averments in the complaint, read on its face, do not disclose the ingredients necessary to constitute offences under the Penal Code. An attempt has been made by the first respondent to cloak a civil dispute with a criminal nature despite the absence of the ingredients necessary to constitute a criminal offence. The complaint filed by the first respondent against the appellants constitutes an abuse of process of court and is liable to be quashed. Learned counsel for the appellant further submits that Respondent No. 2 has neither denied execution of MoU nor grant of marketing rights to the company of the Appellants. It is further submitted that since variation in supplementary agreement, allotting an additional area of 8000 sq. ft to the Petitioner Company in lieu of partial payment made to Religare Finvest Ltd. was not made in writing, therefore, Respondent No. 2 has made an attempt to cloak the transactions of the Appellants as a criminal offence. It is also contended that since the dispute between the parties had any way been adjudicated by the arbitrator therefore the existing criminal complaint is liable to be quashed. Respondent No. 2 who appeared in person on the contrary submits that the developer company of the Appellants being entitled to sell only.