GOPAL SINGH Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Heard Sri Rajesh Kumar Singh, learned advocate for the petitioners and Sri S.S. Dwivedi, learned senior advocate for the opposite party no. 2. A 144 proceeding was initiated at the instance of opposite party no. 2 giving rise to Misc. Case No. 625 of 2012. It appears from the records that before the Magistrate, there were two reports of the police; the first report being unacceptable to the petitioners as according to them it was a report prepared without visiting the site, and the second report by the police indicating that the petitioners had cultivated the land in dispute and there were standing crops of wheat and maze on the same.

(2.) Since there were competing claims with respect to possession of the concerned plot of land by the parties, the Magistrate, in his wisdom, passed an order dated 19.01.2013 holding that there could be a possibility of breach of peace and therefore converted the proceeding under Section 144 into one under Section 145. This order of the learned Sub-Divisional Magistrate, Saharsa Sadar was challenged by the petitioner before the learned Additional Sessions Judge-I, Saharsa vide Cr. Rev. No. 38 of 2013, which challenge did not succeed.

(3.) The matter travelled to this Court where a bench of this Court vide order dated 07.08.2018 passed in Cr. Misc. No. 3635 of 2015 found that the learned Sub- Divisional Magistrate, Saharsa as well as the revisional court fell in error in converting the proceeding under Section 144 into one under 145 when the second report of the police indicated that the crops had been sown by the petitioners over the said plot of land and that they were in possession and had been cultivating the said plot of land since 1962. This Court therefore was of the view that the conversion of the proceeding under Section 145 was unwarranted and the revisional court wrongly upheld the order of the learned Magistrate.