SAT PAL BHATIA Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) PETITIONER Satpal Bhatia was working as manager in the Indian Overseas Bank at Moga from 1984 to 1986. On July 30, 1986 the regional office of the Bank at Chandigarh informed the Assistant Director in the Enforcement Directorate, Ministry of Finance, Government of India, posted at Jalandhar that the petitioner had committed gross irregularity by falsification of the record of the Bank and also committed infraction of the Exchange Control Regulation. This led to the petitioner being arrested under Section 35 read with Section 8(1) of the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act, 1973 (hereinafter referred to as 'FERA'), by acquiring and transferring foreign currency to one Joginder Pal Jain, who was not an authorised dealer in foreign exchange as per the provisions of the Act. An inquiry was conducted and a penalty of Rs. 3,50,000/- was imposed on the petitioner, which order was challenged before the chairman, FERA. The Assistant Director had also filed a complaint under Section 56 of the FERA before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Jalandhar, which was pending at the time of the filing of the present petition. In addition to the complaint, FIR No. 18/87 dated August 21, 1987 was also lodged with the CBI/SpE/Chandigarh on the basis of which a charge sheet was submitted before the Special Court CBI at Patiala.

(2.) ACCORDING to the petitioner, the complaint filed by the Assistant Director as well as the charge sheet pertained to the same incident and as the offence committed by him was the same, he cannot be tried in two different Courts at two different places and the filing of the charge sheet is an abuse of the process of law as the complaint in the Court at Jalandhar had been pending for more than three years. The petitioner relies on Section 186 of the Code of Criminal Procedure and prays that the latter charge sheet has to be quashed.

(3.) I have heard Mr. A.S. Kalra, Advocate on behalf of the petitioner and Mr. Rajan Gupta, Advocate on behalf of the respondents.