SHARAD ARORA Vs. STATE OF U.P.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Jurisdiction of this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India is invoked in the present bunch of writ petitions, filed with the prayer to quash the First Information Report in Case Crime No.47 of 2022, under Ss. 406, 409, 420, 467, 468, 471, 477-A and 120-B IPC, Police Station Phase-I, District Commissionerate Gautam Buddh Nagar, as also the order dtd. 18/2/2022 passed by the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Gautam Buddh Nagar directing lodging of aforesaid FIR, primarily on the ground that offences alleged therein are essentially in the nature of commercial dispute, which ought to have been resolved by way of arbitration and lodgement of first information report is an abuse of the process of law.

(2.) The informant company and its authorized signatory i.e. respondent no. 3 and 4 have appeared on a caveat and have objected to the maintainability of the writ petition, at this stage, urging that prima facie commissioning of cognizable offence is disclosed in the F.I.R. and the investigating agencies be allowed to proceed with the investigation and the rights and contentions advanced, on behalf of the petitioners, be left open for its examination upon conclusion of investigation. It is stressed that extent of offence since is yet to be determined, therefore, investigation into allegations are necessary before embarking upon adjudication of questions raised in these writ petitions. Arguments accordingly have been concluded by the respective counsel for the parties on the aspect relating to entertainability of the present writ petition, at this stage, and the need to interfere with the impugned First Information Report, as of now. The writ petitions, accordingly, are being disposed off by this common judgment with Writ Petition No.2672 of 2022 (Sharad Arora and another Vs. State of U.P. through Principal Secretary, Home, Lucknow and others) treated as the leading case.

(3.) We have heard Sri Dileep Kumar, learned Senior Counsel assisted by Sri Sudhanshu Kumar, Sri Manish Singh, Mr. Rajrshi Gupta and Sri Ramesh Chandra Yadav for the petitioners, Sri Arunendra Singh, learned AGA for the State and Sri Aman Lekhi learned Senior Counsel assisted by Sri Krishnarjun, Ms. Katyayini, Ms. Ranjana Roy Gaurai, Sri Ujjwal Jain, Ms. Niharika Behl and Smt. Diksha Mishra for the respondents.