A single judge bench of the Madras High Court comprising of Justice R.N. Manjula, while hearing a Petition to quash the order of the Magistrate for registering an FIR, held that when a complaint contains Material Particulars and an order for FIR is passed without mentioning the reasons of Prima Facie satisfaction, then it cannot be quashed just because the reasons were absent.
Brief Facts:
This Criminal Original Petition has been filled by Mr. C.Kasthuriraj who was the accused to set aside the order dated 08 July 2019 on the file of the learned V Metropolitan Magistrate, Egmore, Chennai. On the complaint of the given de facto complainant under Section 156(3) of CrPC before the V Metropolitan Magistrate, Egmore, Chennai, an order was passed to register an FIR. This order has been challenged by the petitioner who is the respondent in the complaint. In brief the De Facto Complainant was an accountant in the petitioner’s firm. From 2011 onwards the petitioner started approaching the complainant started approaching the complainant in an inappropriate and unsolicited manner and this became a habit for him. This kept on happening and on 11.05.2019, the petitioner bluntly demanded that the complainant should adjust him the complainant did not yield to his demands and then she was dismissed from the Company. On these allegations, under section 156(3) a petition was filed before the Magistrate along with an affidavit where she stated that since the police did not take any action on the complaint therefore, she filed this petition.
Contentions of the Petitioner
The counsel for the petitioner contended that the impugned order was cryptic and does not speak about the justifications for directing the first respondent to register the FIR and they also alleged that even prior to the complaint, the complainant has misappropriated the company’s fund and have abused her position as an Accounts officer and a complaint regarding the same was lodged on 27.05.2019. Therefore, it was contended that the complaint by the complainant was a counterblast and has been given with false allegations. Further the complaint was contended to be improbable because the complainant continued working even after the alleged sexual harassment from the year 2011 and if the said harassment was true then the complainant would not have continued her service with the petitioner’s company, the complaint was filled to escape from the pending criminal case, bit the learned magistrate did not properly appreciate the materials and passed a cryptic order. For the support of the contentions, several judgments were cited.
Contentions of the Respondent
It was contended by the respondent’s side that it was submitted by the police that the complaint discloses a cognizable offence and the learned Magistrate after being satisfied about the contents has passed an order directing the first respondent to register the complaint. Further since the petitioner is the proposed accused, he has no locus standi to file a petition at this stage and is not entitled to any opportunity of hearing at the stage of pending investigation. And the order passed u/s 155(3) is a final order and the petitioner is not entitled to maintain a petition u/s 482 of the Cr.P.C. For supporting the submissions several judgments were cited.
Observations of the court:
The court pointed that before the current petition was taken on file, the petition was listed on the point of maintainability and after hearing the petitioner, this court ordered to take the petition on file. Then the court differentiated the current case from the case Priyanka Srivastava v. State of Uttar Pradesh and Others as has been relied by the petitioner regarding the order being a cryptic one. And it was noted that the allegations as made by the complainant were sufficient enough to make out a case for sexual harassment in the work place or any other related offence. Further the complainant had also produced the messages sent by the petitioner and it was produced as a document with the petition, so it cannot be said that the allegations were bald and the court gave the order without any basis. Although it was corrected that the court has to record the reasons basing on the allegations as to how it got satisfied about the prima facie case, but that doesn’t mean that the order was passed without application of mind and it cannot be the reason to set aside the order. Further the motives of the complaint can be put to test only when a detailed investigation takes place and the court did not find any material to interfere with the order passed by the learned Magistrate.
Decision of the Court:
The Criminal Original Petition against the order was dismissed and the order passed by the learned V Metropolitan Magistrate, Egmore, Chennai dr. 08.07.2019 was confirmed and in view pf that the second Criminal Original Petition for registration of an FIR was closed. Further Consequently the connected miscellaneous petition was closed.
Case Title: C. Kasthuriraj vs the State
Coram: Honourable Ms. Justice R.N. Manjula
Case No.: Crl. O.P No. 22099 & 22374 of 2019 and Crl.M.P.No.11457 of 2019
Advocate for the Appellant: Mr. A. Ramesh, SC for Mr. G.R.Hari
Advocate for the Respondent: Mr. A. Gopinath for R1; Mr. T. Mohan for R2
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