SONI Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This petition purports to have been filed under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (for short, the Code) with the allegations which are these: The Station House Officer, Police Station Nuh, submitted a report on 26th September, 1980, in the Court of Sub- Divisional Magistrate, Nuh, to the effect that there is a dispute between the petitioners and Kishan respondent in respect of possession of land which is likely to result in breach of peace and prayed that proceeding under Section 145 of the Code be initiated and the land alongwith the crop standing on it, be attached till it is determined as to who is in possession of the said land. On 6th October, 1980, after the appearance of the parties the learned Sub-Divisional Magistrate passed the order that there is apprehension of breach of peace over the possession of the land in dispute and hence the land alongwith the crops standing on it be attached. The petitioners went up in revision against that order and the same was dismissed by the Additional Sessions Judge, Gurgaon, on 3rd November, 1980. By means of the present petition, the orders of the two Courts below are sought to be quashed by invoking the provisions of Section 482 of the Code.

(2.) The present petition has to fail as being incompetent. It is an admitted fact that the revision petition filed by the petitioners before the Additional Sessions Judge has been dismissed and the order of the learned Additional Sessions Judge clearly indicates that the merits of the case had been gone into at considerable length. A concurrent jurisdiction is vested under the law in the Court of Sessions and the High Court and the Sessions Judge can exercise powers of revision. It is provided in Section 397 (3) of the Code that if an application for revision is made by any person either to the High Court or to the Sessions Judge, no further application by the same person shall be entertained by the other of them. Obviously second revision petition could not have been filed in this case and that is why a recourse to Section 482 of the Code seems to have been made. However, such a course cannot be permitted in the garb of an application filed under some other provision of law. In this view I am fortified by a decision in Jagir Singh v. Ranbir Singh and another1, wherein it has been observed as under:

(3.) The revision application before the High Court cannot be treated as an application directed against the order of the Sessions Judge instead of as one directed against the order of the Magistrate. It is not permissible to do so. What may not be done directly cannot be allowed to be done indirectly; that would be an evasion of the statute. It is a well known principle of law that the provisions of Act of Parliament shall not be evaded by shift or contrivance.