Delhi High Court
Rakesh Dhawan vs Commissioner Of Police & Ors. on 6 August, 2010
Author: Shiv Narayan Dhingra
* IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI
Date of Reserve: July 26, 2010
Date of Order: August 06, 2010
+ W.P. (Crl.) 1339 of 2008
% 06.08.2010
RAKESH DHAWAN ..... Petitioner
Through: Ms. Geetha Luthra, Sr. Advocate
versus
COMMISSIONER OF POLICE & ORS. ..... Respondent
Through: Ms. Meera Bhatia, ASC for State
Mr. Rajpal Singh and Mr. Rohit Kumar for R-6 to 11.
JUSTICE SHIV NARAYAN DHINGRA
1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment?
2. To be referred to the reporter or not?
3. Whether judgment should be reported in Digest?
JUDGMENT
1. Present petition was filed by the petitioner with the prayer that the Court
should give directions to respondent to protect the life and liberty of the
petitioner and his family members and that the Court should also direct the
respondent to register an FIR against the accused persons named in the
complaints dated 10th June, 2008 and 11th August, 2008 under Section 406, 419,
420, 467, 468, 471 & 506 of IPC read with Section 120-B thereof and action
should be taken against the police officials for not registering the FIR.
2. When the petition was taken up on 23rd April, 2009, this Court gave
directions in respect of prayer seeking protection and directed the respondent to
ensure that no physical harm was caused to the petitioner. Regarding
complaints, directions were given to the respondent to file Action Taken
Report/Status Report. It was reported to the Court by the respondent (State)
that the matter was referred to vigilance department of Central District and the
inquiry was being conducted into the allegations made by the petitioner.
3. Status Report filed by the respondent shows that the allegations were
made by the petitioner regarding the forging of a resignation letter. The
petitioner is a member of a Trust and the petitioner's contention was that he had
never resigned from Governing Body of the Trust, however, a forged resignation
letter was prepared by some of the persons and he was shown to have resigned
from the Trust. The respondent (police) referred the resignation letter to FSL and
the report of FSL showed that resignation letter dated 13 th August, 2006 did bear
the signatures of the petitioner. However, no opinion in respect of authenticity
of other documents purportedly sent by the petitioner was given by the FSL. The
police, therefore, came to conclusion that no case was made out for registration
of FIR or action against the respondent.
4. It is argued by counsel for the petitioner that a comparison of signatures
of the petitioner could have been done only with an admitted signature of him
and it was not known which signatures of the petitioner were sent to FSL,
therefore, the Court should ignore the report of FSL and give directions for
registration of FIR.
5. It is settled law that where unfounded or vague allegations are made,
police had a right to conduct preliminary enquiry before registration of FIR. In
the present case, the petitioner, who was one of the members of the Trust had
alleged that he had not resigned from the previous Governing Body of Trust and
it was wrongly considered that he had resigned from the Trust. The letter acted
upon by the Governing Body was not written by him.
6. The allegations and counter-allegations in respect of management of
Society/Trust is a common thing and the police had done nothing wrong by first
verifying whether the resignation letter was actually sent by the petitioner or not.
Police sent admitted signature of petitioner for comparison with disputed
signature. FSL report showed that resignation letter was signed by the petitioner.
7. Once the police had come to a conclusion that the letter sent by the
petitioner was not forged, I find no reason why FIR should have been registered
by the police. I, therefore, find no force in the prayer for registration of FIR made
in the petition. The petition in respect of this prayer is dismissed. The relief of
protection has already been granted.
AUGUST 06, 2010 SHIV NARAYAN DHINGRA, J.
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