RAJINDER SINGH Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) FROM a perusal of the First Information Report Exhibit P.1 it is abundantly clear that M/s. Punjab Savings (India) Ltd., of which petitioner Ranjit Singh is Manager and petitioner Yudhbir Singh is the Managing Director, have closed down 14 of their branches after collecting huge fixed term deposits from the area covered, thereby rendering it well nigh impossible for the deposits to collect their deposits from them on maturity. The allegation is that the Managing Director has committed criminal breach of trust in respect of these deposits and is living in luxury after closing down the business. The Managing Director, two Directors as also the Manager have all moved for quashing of the First Information Report on the ground of liability to repay the deposits on maturity being purely civil.

(2.) OBSERVATIONS made by this Court in Chitranjan Mohan Vashisht v. Nirmal Singh, 1986 Chandigarh Criminal Cases 255 and Dharavir and others v. State of Punjab, 1986(2) Recent Criminal Reports 559 are on distinguishable facts and are, therefore, wholly irrelevant on the peculiar facts and circumstances of the present case because through their own action in closing down their business establishments at as many as 14 branches, the petitioners have rendered it impossible for the depositors to make demands for return of their deposits on maturity and confirmed their (of the depositors) belief that the petitioners have committed a criminal breach of trust of their deposits with M/s. Punjab Savings (India) Ltd.