SUDIPTA SEN Vs. ABHIJIT DEB ROY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS Criminal Petition which has been registered as a Criminal Revision Petition, has been filed by the petitioner for quashing the criminal proceedings in CR Case No. 673 (S)2005 under Section 120b/201/468/420/477 IPC pending before the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Shillong.

(2.) HEARD Mr. R. P. Sharma, the learned senior counsel for the petitioner assisted by Mr. S. P. Mahanta, the learned Advocate and Mr. L. R. Das, the learned counsel for the respondents.

(3.) THE material facts of the case are that the petitioner is the Managing Director of M/s Sarada Construction Company Private Limited, which is a private company registered under the Company Act, 1956 and is a resident of Diamond Harbour Road, Opposite Behala Tram Depot, PS. Behala, Kolkata-34, West Bengal. The respondents filed a criminal complaint against the petitioner alongwith three other accused. All the respondents are permanent residents of Shillong, Meghalaya. While the respondent Nos. 1, 2 and 3 are College Teachers in different Colleges of Shillong, the respondent No. 4 is a Central Government employee. The respondent No. 5 is serving in a corporate house while the respondent No. 6 is a housewife by occupation. On the death of the respondent No. 5, his son stepped into his shoes and continued the case as the legal heir of the deceased respondent No. 5. The case of the respondents is that sometime in the year 1991, an Association under the name and style of Ram Thakur Abasan Association ("association" for short) was founded by some employees of the State Bank of India for preparing a master plan of developing plots of land at Poilan, 24 Parganas (S), for which one M. K. Nandi, a former employee of the State Bank of India, Shillong Main Branch was engaged on behalf of the Association for distributing and collecting membership fees. The Association was subsequently converted into a Private Limited Company in which the accused Nos. 2 and 3 are holding the post of Directors. The Association came to be registered as Ram Thakur Abasan Limited. According to the respondents, on being induced, they became members of the Association on payment of Rs. 525/- and were also made to pay a further sum of Rs. 6000/- by each of them towards development costs of the plots of land. The respondents, after becoming the members thereof, made full payment of the cost of the plots by instalments. The Company thereafter sent registered sale deeds in respect of the aforesaid plots to the respondents but failed to hand over actual possession thereof till date. It is the case of the respondents that the accused Nos. 2, 3 and 4 entered into a criminal conspiracy with the petitioner and most illegally handed over all the assets of the Association including the plots of the respondents to the petitioner on 17. 5. 2001, a fact which was duly intimated by the remaining accused vide the notice dated 17. 5. 2001. The respondents by the same notice were also stated to have been asked to attend a meeting on 21. 7. 2001 at Shillong which was to be attended by the petitioner. It is also the case of the respondents that the petitioner thereafter issued a letter to them giving bogus reasons behind his taking over possession of their plots/assets and visited Shillong on 22. 7. 2001 and had a meeting at Anupchand High School, Keating Road, Shillong with the respondents and other members of the Association from Shillong. In the meeting, the petitioner was alleged to have made promises to hand over the developed plots to the respondents and to open an office Company at Shillong for coordinating the functioning of the company, which he failed to keep. The petitioner is also alleged to have caused disappearance of vital documents and falsified accounts in order to cheat the complainant and other members. It is the further case of the respondents that the petitioner, the accused Nos. 2 and 3 had called for the AGM of the Association on 17. 3. 2002 at the camp office at Saradha Gardens of the Company and that in that meeting, the petitioner is said to have deployed his armed henchmen to rowbeat the members present and got several proposals, favourable to him passed in the meeting. This, according to the respondents, was designed to deprive the respondents of their land/money as well as to force them to make further payments without justifiable reason. It is thus alleged by the respondents that the aforesaid acts of commissions or omissions constitute the offences punishable under Section 120b/201/468/420/477a of the IPC.