PROVIDENT FUND INSPECTOR Vs. BRAKE LINING LTD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) TWENTY -four Criminal Revision Petitions bearing Nos. 419 to 442 have all been filed by the Provident Fund Inspector, Faridabad, in this court against the order of discharge dated November 14, 1994. made in favour of the respondents, by the learned Judicial Magistrate 1st Class, Faridabad, separately, in all his twenty-four complaints aforesaid, filed against them, under the Employees Provident Funds and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952, for their failure to deposit the contributions due from them in respect of their employees with the State Provident Funds Commissioner in due time.

(2.) IN operative part of its impugned order dated Nov ember 14, 1984, learned trial court observed, "No specific liability of the accused has been fixed nor it is even prima facie shown as to how they can be made liable for any offence under the Act. The complaints are stereotyped petitions filed in a perfunctory manner". The sole point requiring attention of this court is whether the averments found wanting by the learned trial court were required to be made by the petitioner in the complaints before it to warrant the inference regarding existence of a prima-facie base and sustain the making of a summoning order against the respondents.

(3.) REFERRING to the observations made in Dwijendra Nath Singha and others v. The State and others, 1978 Lab. IC 1420; U.P. Urban Buildings (Regulation of Letting, Rent and Eviction)State (Delhi Admn.) v. I.K. Nangia and others, AIR 1979 Supreme Court 1977; U.P. Urban Buildings (Regulation of Letting, Rent and Eviction)Ram Kirpal Prasad and others v. The State of Bihar and others, 1986 Lab. IC 571 and U.P. Urban Buildings (Regulation of Letting, Rent and Eviction)Sampat Mal Lodha v. State of Rajasthan and others, 1998 Cri. LJ 298, it has been urged on behalf of the petitioner that it is not necessary that in the petition or complaint it must be stated now and in what manner each of the partners is in charge of and was responsible to the company for the conduct of the business of the company. That would be a matter of evidence. Where a complaint stated that the accused were partners of the defaulting firm and as partners were in charge of and responsible to the firm for the conduct of its business, the averments in the complaint were sufficient for the purpose of the issue of the proms.