ANJALI DEVI, LALITHA NIVAS Vs. V. SREEKANTAN NAIR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The accused in a prosecution for the offence under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 (for short 'the N.I.Act') approached this Court by preferring the above revision petition challenging her conviction and sentence, imposed as per judgments of the trial court as well as the lower appellate court.

(2.) The case of the complainant is that, towards the repayment of the amount due to the complainant, the accused issued a cheque dated 15.10.2001 for an amount of Rs. 75,000/-, which when presented for encashment dishonoured for want of sufficient funds in the account maintained by the accused and the cheque amount was not repaid inspite of a formal demand notice and thus the revision petitioner has committed the offence punishable under Section 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act. With the said allegation, the complainant approached the Chief Judl. Magistrate Court-Thiruvananthapuram, by filing a formal complaint, upon which cognizance was taken under Section 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act and instituted S.T.No.159/02. During the course of the trial PW1 was examined from the side of the complainant and Exts.P1 to P4 were produced and marked. From the side of the defence, the accused herself was mounted to the box and gave evidence as Dws.1 and 2 and produced Exts.D1 to D7 documents. On the basis of the available materials and evidence on record, the trial court has found that the cheque in question was issued by the revision petitioner/ accused for the purpose of discharging her debt due to the complainant. Thus accordingly the court found that, the complainant has established the case against the accused/ revision petitioner and consequently found that the accused is guilty and thus convicted her under Section 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act. On conviction, the trial court sentenced the revision petitioner to undergo simple imprisonment for 1 year and to pay fine of Rs. 80,000/- and the default sentence is fixed as 2 months simple imprisonment.

(3.) Challenging the above conviction and sentence the accused preferred an appeal and by judgment dated 25.9.2010 in Crl.A.638/04 the court of the Additional Sessions Judge (Fast Track Court III), Thiruvananthapuram, allowed the appeal only in part. Accordingly, the appellate court sentenced the revision petitioner to undergo simple imprisonment till rising of the court and also directed to pay compensation of Rs. 75,000/- to the complainant under Section 357(3) of Cr.P.C. and in default to undergo simple imprisonment for 3 months. It is the above conviction and sentence challenged in this revision petition.