YESHVIR GOYAL Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Though the matter is listed for admission, on the request made by the learned counsel for the petitioner and the learned Central Government Standing Counsel, the matter is taken up for final hearing. Admit, This petition is filed under Section 482, Cr. P.C. seeking to quash the complaint lodged against the petitioners for the offences punishable under Sections 420 and 120-B, IPC read with Sections 276-C and 277 of Income Tax Act. The point for consideration in this case is whether in the absence of prima facie and a reasonable case to proceed with investigation this Court should refuse to exercise its powers under Section 482 of Cr. P.C. Sri B.V. Acharya, learned counsel for the petitioners, submits that, if the entire complaint is read, it does not disclose that offences punishable under Section 420 read with Section 120-B of IPC has been made out.

(2.) Sri Shylendra Kumar, learned Central Government Standing Counsel for the respondents, submits that the ingredients of the offences punishable under Section 420 read with Section 120-B, IPC have been made out in the complaint. The Department felt that the main idea of the petitioners was to cheat the Department in making an attempt to escape from payment of tax amounting to the tune of rupees Ten lakhs. He further submits that the complaint if read as a whole, it is clear that a case has been made out, merely because the wordings as mentioned in the Indian Penal Code are not mentioned in the complaint, that itself is not sufficient to contend that no prima facie case has been made out. He further submits that this Court can quash either F.I.R. or investigations only under exceptional and extraordinary circumstances. The present proceedings are not of that type. In support of this contention, he relied upon the decision of the Supreme Court in State of Bihar v Murad Ali Khan and Others, AIR 1989 SC 1, wherein it is held as follows:

(3.) It is trite that jurisdiction under Section 482, Cr.P.C. which saves the inherent power of the High Court, to make such orders as may be necessary to prevent abuse of the process of any Court or otherwise to secure the ends of justice, has to be exercised sparingly and with circumspection. In exercising that jurisdiction the High Court would not embark upon an enquiry whether the allegations in the complaint are likely to be established by evidence or not. That is the function of the Trial Magistrate when the evidence comes before him. Though it is neither possible nor advisable to lay down any inflexible rules to regulate that jurisdiction, one thing, however, appears clear and it is that when the High Court is called upon to exercise this jurisdiction to quash a proceeding at the stage of the Magistrate taking cognizance of an offence the High Court is guided by the allegations, whether those allegations, set out in the complaint or the charge-sheet, do not in law constitute or spellout any offence and that resort to criminal proceedings, would, in the circumstances, amount to an abuse of the process of the Court or not."