ASHOK JAMNA DASS THAKKAR Vs. SHRI VARINDER KUMAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) COMPLAINT annexure P. I translation whereof in court language is annexure P. 1/T, was filed by respondent No. 1 against the petitioner in Criminal Misc. No. 6282 M of 1987 in the court of learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Kapurthala, on May 5, 1987. After recording the preliminary evidence, learned Chief Judicial Magistrate ordered the summoning of the petitioner under section 420 of the Indian Penal Code on the same day.

(2.) ALLEGATIONS levelled against the petitioner in complaint annexure P. I are that respondent No. 1 met him in the premises of M/s Oberoi Travel Agents, Kapurthala, around 12 noon on January 4, 1987 along with Harbhajan Singh P.W.2, Kuldip Kumar P.W.3 &his younger brother Narinder Kumar, that there in the petitioner demanded Rs. 25,000 per person for sending them to America, that the complainant and one other person paid to the petitioner Rs. 15,000 each and agreed to pay Rs. 10,000 each more at the time of their departure for America, that both of them under instructions from the petitioner and on his asking visited Bombay on March 29, 1987 and again on April 26, 1987, that in the course of their subsequent visit on April 26, 1987 they learnt that the petitioner was not working as travel agent and had, therefore, misappropriated the amount of Rs. 15,000 each paid by the complainant and one more person to the petitioner on January 4, 1987. Hence the complaint for cheating annexure P. 1.

(3.) THE only question which calls for determination in this case is whether on the basis of allegations levelled against the petitioner in complaint annexure P. I it can be said that he is guilty of cheating as defined in section 415 and made punishable under section 417 of the Indian Penal Code. Relevant section 415 of the Indian Penal Code reads :