PETER Vs. KURIAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) All the five petitioners are accused in two criminal cases, one instituted on police report (Annexure-I) and another instituted on a complaint filed by the first respondent (Annexure-II). The incident which gave rise to both cases was the same. Learned . magistrate, who took the complaint case on file when the police case was pending in his court, has now ordered that both cases "would be tried together, but not consolidated". The accused are aggrieved by the said order. Hence they have come up with this petition to quash it.

(2.) Learned magistrate referred to the decision of the Supreme Court in Harjinder Singh v. State of Punjab ( AIR 1985 SC 404 ) and the decision of this Court in Mani v. Swaminathan ( 1986 KLT 170 ) to support the course of procedure which he has adopted with the two cases.

(3.) Facts alleged in both cases are substantially the same, the persons arrayed as accused in both cases are the same and the offences mentioned in both cases are also the same. According to the learned counsel for the petitioners, unless the two cases are tried together as envisaged in S.223 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (for short 'the Code') prejudice would be caused to the accused besides the hardships which they have to bear in facing two criminal prosecutions on the same incident.