The single judge bench of the Jharkhand High Court held that mere breach of contract cannot give rise to criminal prosecution for cheating unless fraudulent or dishonest intention is shown right at the beginning of the transaction.
Brief facts
The factual matrix of the case is that the FIR was registered in which it was alleged that a notice was issued to the shopkeeper for vacating the shop as one marriage hall was to be constructed on the building. Furthermore, the meeting took place between the shopkeeper and they authorized Abhay Kumar Singh (petitioner no.1), who is running a Xerox shop in the said market, to file a writ petition before the Hon'ble High Court. After that, the order was passed to maintain the status quo until the next hearing, however, Petitioner No. 1 withdrew the case without obtaining the consent of the other Petitioners. When other petitioners asked about the matter of why you have committed such type of cheating then he replied that he has committed the cheating and they can do whatever they want to do. Thereafter, the FIR was lodged. Aggrieved by this, the present petition is filed in order to quash the entire criminal proceeding which is pending before the Court of the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate.
Observations of the Court
The Hon’ble Court observed that in the situations where the resolution was complied with, the writ petition was filed and even an interim order was passed by the High Court, the intention from the very inception is missing against the petitioners, which is one of the essential ingredients to make out the case of cheating and the same is lacking in the instant case.
It was furthermore observed that if dishonest or fraudulent intent is not present from the beginning of the transaction, a mere breach of contract cannot result in criminal prosecution for cheating.
The court relied upon the judgments titled Mitesh Kumar J. Sha v. State of Karnataka and others, N. Raghavender v. State of Andhra Pradesh, CBI, State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal, and Vijay Kumar Ghai and others v. State of West Bengal and others.
Based on these considerations, the court was of the opinion that no offense of cheating had been made out and the court quashed the criminal proceedings.
The decision of the court
With the above direction, the court allowed the Petition.
Case Title: Abhay Kumar @ Abhay Kumar Singh V. The State of Jharkhand
Coram: Hon’ble Mr. Justice Sanjay Kumar Dwivedi
Case No.: Cr.M.P. No. 366 of 2017
Advocate for the Petitioner: Mr. Santosh Kumar Tiwari, Advocate
Advocate for the State: Mr. Fahad Allam, A.P.P
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