MANMOHAN AGRAWAL AND OTHERS Vs. DR.RAHUL PARASHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present petition has been preferred under section 482 of Cr.P.C. by the petitioners herein for quashing proceedings in complaint case No.2961/2006, whereby the order dated 28.07.2005 passed by the Court of learned JMFC, Chhindwara, cognizance of an offence under section 500 of IPC for defamation, was taken against the petitioners herein. The petitioners no.1 to 3 are associated with the Dainik Bhaskar News Paper in their capacity as Chief Editor, Editor and local Editor respectively.

(2.) The brief facts giving rise to the present petition are as follows. A news article was printed in the Chhindwara Edition, of the Dainik Bhaskar, which is marked and annexed herein as Annexure-P/3 of the petition. It bore a news article with the headline "ccZjrkiwoZd fudkyk ckfydk ds nkrks dk dsi ". In the said article an emotional reportage of an incident that had taken place with a young girl aged 8 years was published whereby, a Doctor (Dentist) had initially disclosed Rs.8000/- as the expenditure for capping four of her teeth. The said amount was paid to the Doctor in two installments by the father of the child. However, subsequently, the Doctor is stated to have inflated the expenditure for the procedure to Rs.40,000/-. Upon the amount not being paid by the father of the girl, the Doctor is stated to have removed the caps forcibly in the utmost barbaric manner resulting in pain and bleeding to the child. It is pertinent to mention herein that there is no name of the Doctor who had treated the child and neither is the name of the hospital mentioned in the said news article, where the procedure is said to have taken place.

(3.) The respondent filed a complaint case under Section 200 of Cr.P.C against the petitioners seeking their prosecution under 500 IPC on account of his fair name being besmirched on account of the reportage. The complaint is annexed as Annexure-P/2 from page 17 to 20 of the petition. The Doctor has denied that he had ever committed any kind of malpractice and in paragraph-4 of the complaint, gives the sequence of events on various dates on which he was approached. He further states that the amount of expenditure that was to be incurred in the procedure was also disclosed to the father of the child.