Rajasthan High Court: The petitioner preferred a criminal miscellaneous petition under Section 482 CrPC for quashing of FIR No. 322/2016 for the offences under Sections 115 and 108 IPC.
Learned counsel for the petitioner argued that taking advantage of an official position and being a politically powerful person, Respondent 2 has lodged the FIR with a limited object of putting undue pressure upon the present petitioner. Learned counsel for the petitioner has also raised the issue of criminal antecedents of Respondent 2, which according to him, reflected that Respondent 2 himself was not on the right side of law.
Learned Public Prosecutor assured the Court that appropriate, proper, fair and impartial investigation has to be made in this case and all the stands taken by the petitioner, respondent-complaint has to be considered at the time of investigation and before completing the same, no indulgence ought to be granted by this Court under the inherent jurisdiction under Section 482 CrPC at this stage.
Learned Public Prosecutor also stated that the scope of Section 482 CrPC has to be strictly looked into, in terms of the original criminal jurisprudence emanating out of the precedent law laid down by the Hon’ble Apex Court in State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal, 1992 Supp (1) SCC 335, whereby it has been held that the powers under Section 482 Cr.P.C. can be invoked where the allegations made in the FIR or complaint are absurd and inherently improbable. He also cited the case of Gurumukh Das v. State of Rajasthan, 2016 0 Supreme (Raj) 1086, wherein the Rajasthan High Court had held that it was the statutory right of the police to investigate, where FIR disclosed commission of offence, and in such cases, FIR should not be quashed.
The High Court opined that on a bare reading of the FIR, it was apparent that it was not a case where any indulgence could be granted to the petitioner, as the wordings of the FIR, prima facie, clearly constituted an offence, and therefore, there was no reason to by-pass the settled procedure of investigation and trial in this case. The High Court, taking note of the fact that the petitioner himself had a case under Section 302 IPC registered against him on the basis on an overall assessment of the facts as well as the record of the case, held that the case did not call for any interference under the inherent jurisdiction of the Court under Section 482 CrPC.
Consequently dismissing the miscellaneous petition the Court directed a free, fair and impartial investigation to be made in the matter, thereby, concluding the case to be unfit for invocation of inherent jurisdiction under Section 482 CrPC. [Hari Ram v. State of Rajasthan, 2017 SCC OnLine Raj 2400, decided on 5.7.2017]