By keeping in view the facts and circumstances of the case, the Delhi High Court observed that it would be perilous for this Court to rely upon the agreement or compromise to justify quashing the FIR in question, particularly when the complainant is contesting the merits of the instant petition under Section 482 of the Cr.P.C.
A Single Bench of Justice Chandra Dhari Singh dismissed the instant petition which was preferred by the petitioners under Section 482 of Cr.P.C. whereby they were seeking to quash the FIR registered against the offences punishable under Sections 384/420/467/468/471/477/506/120-B/34 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 by observing that Court should exercise its extraordinary powers under section 482 of the Cr.P.C only when it is satisfied that the settlement agreement or the compromise between the victim and the offender has been freely and voluntarily executed or reached.
The present petition was preferred under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure , 1973 by the petitioners whereby they were seeking quashing of FIR registered against the offences punishable under Sections 384/420/467/468/471/477/506/120-B/34 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860.
Factual matrix of the case was such that the instant FIR was registered against one Mr. Davinder Sharma, Mrs. Sheema Sharma, Mr. Sanjay Kriplani, Mr. Baljit Singh, Mr. Kuldeep Singh and Mr. Hari Om Yadav for the offence of extortion of more than Rs. 100 crores by way of putting the complainant and his wife in fear of death.
It was contended in the instant FIR that the complainant, Mr. Harbhajan Singh Chopra and his wife Surjit Kaur Chopra were the Directors of Hotel Foundation Head. As per the FIR, the extortion by the accused persons began way back at the end of 2007 and in the beginning of the year 2008. The complainant was a British National who migrated to England in 1995 along with his family. It was contended that a few years back, the complainant came back to India and invested his lifelong earned money into ‘Hotel Fountain Head Motel Pvt. Ltd./Hotel Claremont’ and other properties in and around Delhi.
The complainant was lured by misrepresentation and assurance to assist in expanding the operations of the hotel. It was contended that the aforesaid accused persons along with their criminal conspirators had forced, coerced under threat of life and physical harm upon the complainant and his wife, and by way of such threats on gun point, had forced them to sign various documents and cheques for the purpose of creating liability on the company in their favor. It is further contended that under the threat, the complainant has given certain cheques, demand drafts/post dated cheques, and cash and also executed sale deeds in favor of the accused persons.
After hearing the submissions of the parties and after pursuing the material on record, the Court was of the view that the inherent power of the High Court to quash non- compoundable offences is not circumscribed by any of the provisions of the Cr.P.C, including Section 320. Section 482 of the Cr.P.C is a declaration of the inherent power, pre-existing in the High Court and so long as the exercise of the inherent power falls within the parameters of Section 482 of the Cr.P.C., it shall have an overriding effect over any of the provisions of the Cr.P.C.
In exercise of its inherent powers under Section 482 of the Cr.P.C., High Court may permit compounding of a non-compoundable offence, provided that in doing so, it satisfies the conditions mentioned therein. It was further observed that the power to quash criminal proceedings under Section 482 of the Cr.P.C. exists even in non- compoundable offences, however there is no straight jacket formula for the same and the same entirely depends upon the facts of each case.
Any order in violation and breach of the statutory provisions, would be a case against the ends of justice, the Court remarked.
Reliance was placed on the cases namely, CBI v. Keshub Mahindra, Gian Singh v. State of Punjab.
Thus, the question that was posed for consideration before this Court was whether the impugned FIR can be quashed or not by this Court while exercising the inherent power under Section 482 of the Cr.P.C.
In view of the same, the Court stated that the investigating officer recorded the statements of the witnesses, the statement of the complainant and collected all the material evidence. After getting the evidence/materials against an accused person, the investigating agency preferred to file a charge-sheet against the said accused person before the competent Court.
The instant petition under Section 482 of the Cr.P.C was filed at the stage of FIR, therefore, only the allegations in the FIR/complaint were required to be considered and other grounds which have been vehemently contended by the petitioners cannot be adjudicated by this Court in present proceedings.
The main argument of the learned counsel for the petitioners is that the parties have entered into the compromise; therefore, the instant petition was liable to be quashed on the basis of the said compromise. However, the said compromise was disputed by the respondents herein and vehemently opposed the instant petition, the Court noted.
Thus in light of the aforesaid observations, it was clear that the offences in question were non- compoundable and the allegations were investigated by the investigation agency. Undoubtedly, the veracity of the complainant’s allegations of coercion and duress would also have to be tested in any other appropriate proceedings. Be that as it may, once the complainant has claimed that the settlement agreement is not valid in law, this Court cannot prevent the prosecution from making its case against the accused at trial and the judicial precedents to support this conclusion, the Court remarked.
It is therefore clear that this Court should exercise its extraordinary powers under section 482 of the Cr.P.C only when it is satisfied that the settlement agreement or the compromise between the victim and the offender has been freely and voluntarily executed or reached. In the present facts and circumstances, that is not so because the complainant has assailed the very legality of that agreement or compromise.
In the peculiar facts and circumstance of instant case, it would be perilous for this Court to rely upon the agreement or compromise to justify quashing the FIR in question, particularly when the complainant is contesting the merits of the instant petition under section 482 of the Cr.P.C, the Court submitted.
Accordingly, the instant petition was dismissed.
Case name: BALJIT SINGH AND ANR. Vs. STATE & ORS.
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