MOHAMMAD YUSUF Vs. KRISHAN KUMAR GUPTA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this petition under Section 482, Code of Criminal Procedure, the petitioner- accused seeks quashment of FIR No. 266/98 under Sections 448/380/34, Indian Penal Code as also criminal proceedings emanating therefrom pending before a Metropolitan Magistrate.

(2.) Copy of said FIR No. 266 /98 lodged by respondent No. 1 is placed at pages 37 and 38 on the file. It is/ inter alia, alleged therein that the complainant alongwith his brother had been running cloth business in Shop Nos. 351-52, Bazar Delhi Gate, New Delhi; Hari Kishan Dass is the landlord/owner of the shop which the accused claims to have purchased but he has not made available any document of title to the complainant; when the complainant on 7/05/1998 around 9a.m. went to the roof over the shop for keeping waste cardboards, he found that dandas, cardboards, bamboos stored inside the tin-shed as also tin-shed had been removed; on enquiry it was disclosed by Lalit Kumar Satija that said articles after removal from roof, were taken away in the rikshaw by the men of accused at the instance of accused on the night intervening 6th/ 7/05/1998. After completing investigation, charge-sheet was filed against the accused.

(3.) Submission advanced by Mr. Vimal Shankara for respondent No. 1 and Ms. Sudha Varshney for petitioner was that as the parties have arrived at a settlement out of Court, the criminal proceedings are not likely to result in conviction of the petitioner under Sections 380/448/34, Indian Penal Code and the FIR in question as also criminal proceedings emanating therefrom, thus, deserve to be quashed under Section 482, Code of Criminal Procedure indisputably, offence under Section 380, Indian Penal Code is non-compoundable. In the decisions in Ram Lal and Another v. State of J and K, I (1999) CCR 29 (SC)=I (1999) SLT 317=1999(2) SCC 213, which was quoted with approval by a three-Judge Bench in the decision in S.N. Mohanty and Another v. State ofOrissa, III (1999) CCR 20 (SC)=IV (1999) SLT 346=JT 1999(3) SC 408, it was held by the Supreme Court that an offence which law declares to be non-compoundable even with permission of Court, cannot be compounded. In the decision in Madhu Limaye v. State of Maharashtra, AIR 1978 SC 47, it was held that power under Section 482 should not be exercised as against the express bar of law engrafted in any other provision of the Code. Similar is the ratio of the decisions in Simirkhia v. Dolly Mukherjee, AIR 1999 SC 1605; Sooraj Dew v. Pyarelal, AIR 1981 SC 736; Dharampal v. Ramshri, I (1993) CCR 47 (SC)= AIR 1993 SC 1361 and Satya Narayan Sharma v. State of Rajasthan, VI (2001) SLT 725=IV (2001) CCR 64 (SC)=JT 2001 (8) SC 157. Sub-section (9) of Section 320, Code of Criminal Procedure says that no offence shall be compounded except as provided by that section. It case quashment of FIR and criminal proceedings in regard to offence under Section 380, Indian Penal Code is permitted, it would run in the teeth of statutory prohibition as contained in said Sub-section (9) of Section 320, Code of Criminal Procedure Obviously, case is not covered by any of the categories enumerated in the decision in State af Haryana and Others v. Ch. Bhajan Lal and Ors., AIR 1992 SC 604. Amicable settlement between the parties, thus, cannot be validly made the basis for granting the reliefs prayed for in the petition. Accordingly, the petition is dismissed. Petition dismissed.