NAHAR SINGH Vs. STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Leave granted.

(2.) The question which we shall be addressing in this appeal is whether a Magistrate taking cognizance of an offence on the basis of a police report in terms of Sec. 190 (1)(b) of The Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (the Code) can issue summons to any person not arraigned as an accused in the police report and whose name also does not feature in column (2) of such report. In this case the person concerned, being the appellant, was not named in the First Information Report either. The High Court of Judicature at Allahabad has opined on this question in the affirmative in the judgment delivered on 14/5/2015. This judgment is under appeal before us. The Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM), Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh had taken cognizance of offences under Ss. 363, 366 and 376 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (1860 Code) on 8/8/2012 on the basis of police report. These are offences triable before a Court of Session. The police report had named two individuals as accused-Yogesh and Rupa (the spelling of the name of the latter has been interchangeably used in different proceedings emanating from the First Information Report (F.I.R.) as Roopa and Rupa). The police report was made on the basis of an F.I.R made by the mother of a lady victim (prosecutrix) on 9/5/2012 in Police Station Chhatari, sub-district Shikarpur in the district of Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh. In this F.I.R, she stated that on 4/5/2012, her minor daughter was enticed away by said Yogesh and his two or three associates. Later on, a radiologist on the basis of x-ray had found her to be a major, aged about 18 years. But the age-issue of the victim is not in controversy involved in this appeal.

(3.) The Investigating Officer recovered the prosecutrix on 10/5/2012. Her statement under Sec. 161 of the Code was recorded on 10th May itself. In her statement, in substance, she stated that Yogesh had committed rape upon her. The victim was, thereafter, produced before the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Bulandshahr and her statement under Sec. 164 of the Code was recorded on 14/5/2012. In that statement, she had disclosed the names of the accused Rupa, Yogesh as also the appellant herein-Nahar Singh, as the persons who had committed rape upon her. Her statement, inter-alia, was recorded in the following terms:-