BALBIR SINGH Vs. STATE OF UTTARANCHAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By way of this criminal miscellaneous application, moved under Sections 482/483 of Cr.P.C., the prayer has been made to quash the chargesheet no.60/2006 submitted by the Investigating Officer of P.S. Laksar as well as the order of cognizance dated 4.8.2006 passed by the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Haridwar registering a criminal case no.3322 of 2006 against the applicant Balbir Singh as well as two other accused persons Vipin and Raju. The said chargesheet was submitted for the offence of Sections 3/7 of Essential Commodities Act r/w Sections 504/506 IPC on the basis of an FIR which was lodged by one Shri Shiv Kumar Saini, resident of Village Ismailpur within the territorial jurisdiction of P.S. Laksar on dated 30.11.2005. The incident is of the same day at about 3 PM, when Shiv Kumar with the assistance of other villagers Rohit, Sukhveer, Rajesh, Raghpal, Arvind and Vinod (all witnesses of FIR) apprehended the black-marketing of the kerosene oil which was allegedly being done by the accused persons. Sri Balbir Singh is the licence holder of a fair price shop in village Ismailpur and he was running such a shop for a long time. Shiv Kumar along with his companions, afore-named, nabbed 200 litre drum, filled with kerosene oil, when it was being transported from the shop of Balbir Singh situated in village Ismailpur to another village Bakarpur in an Eicher Tractor. When nabbed by villagers, it is alleged that Balbir Singh abused and intimidated all of them with a threat to kill. At the same time, a sizeable number of villagers assembled. Having noticed a large gathering of the villagers, Balbir Singh absconded from the spot, however his companions Vipin and Raju were caught on the spot. All the villagers took the above kerosene oil, along with accused Vipin and Raju, to the concerned police station where the FIR was lodged at 5 PM, bearing crime no.204 of 2005.

(2.) The investigation was made by the police which ended in the submission of chargesheet, as stated above, and the learned Magistrate thereafter passed the impugned order of cognizance.

(3.) It has been contended by learned counsel for the applicant that there was no breach of Control Order on the part of the petitioner. On the other hand, learned AGA for the State by drawing the attention of the Court towards Clause 3 of U.P. Kerosene Control Order, 1962 which prohibits that "no person shall sell, offer for sale or storage for sale of the kerosene oil except under a licence granted by the Licensing Authority of the district in which he carries on business", argued that the petitioner could not show any licence for transporting 200 litres of kerosene oil to another adjacent village named above.