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Calcutta High Court · body

2008 DIGILAW 824 (CAL)

Parimal Kumar Chakraborty v. STATE OF WEST BENGAL

2008-08-13

ASHIM KUMAR ROY

body2008
Judgment :- (1) IN the instant criminal revision the petitioner challenged an order whereby the Court below, rejecting the petitioners prayer for sending his complaint to the police under Section 156 (3) of the Code of Criminal procedure for investigation, took cognizance thereupon. (2) HEARD Mr. Mukteswar Maity, the learned Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner. Perused the impugned order as well as other materials-on-record, more particularly, the petition of complaint. (3) THE provisions of Section 156 (3) of the Code is read as follows: -Section 156 (3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure: 156. (1) Any Officer-in-Charge of a police station may, without the order of a Magistrate, investigate any cognizable case which a court having jurisdiction over the local area within the limits of such station would have power to inquire into or try under the provisions of Chapter-XIII. (2) No proceeding of a police officer in any such case shall at any stage be called in question on the ground that the case was one which such officer was not empowered under this section to investigate. (3) Any Magistrate empowered under Section 190 may order such an investigation as above-mentioned. (4) A plain reading of the aforesaid provision of Section 156 (3) of the Code, makes it abundantly clear that exercise of such power by any court pre-supposes that the Court concerned in empowered to take cognizance on such complaint. The provisions of Section 156 (3) of the code enables a Magistrate to refer a complaint, disclosing commission of cognizable offences, to the police for investigation of such offences of which he may have taken cognizance under Section 190 of the Code, if the Court after prima facie consideration of materials-on-record comes to a conclusion that the case in question requires an investigation by the police. In other words when a Court after prima facie consideration of materials-on-record finds that for collection of evidence relating to the commission of offence and for discovery of the offenders and to unearth the truth behind the allegations made in the complaint, police investigation in necessary then in that case the Court may always refer such complaint, under Section 156 (3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure to the police for investigation instead of taking cognizance by itself. The complainant has no choice in this regard nor can insist a Court to take recourse any particular procedure. The complainant has no choice in this regard nor can insist a Court to take recourse any particular procedure. The nomenclature under which such complaint is made nor the prayer of the complainant has any relevancy. The Magistrate should not necessarily pass any order for police investigation as a matter of routine and merely because the complainant made a prayer for the same. Where in a case on the materials already on record, no further investigation by the police is required for launching a successful prosecution, the Court would be fully justified to take cognizance under section 190 of the Code and to proceed with the same in accordance with the provision of Chapter-XV of the Code. (5) HAVING gone through the entire allegations made in the petition of complaint as well as the other materials-on-record, undoubtedly, the learned Magistrate has not committed any mistake in taking cognizance on the complaint under Section 190 of the Code of Criminal Procedure instead of referring the same under Section 156 (3) of the Code to the police as prayed by the petitioner. It is the case of the complainant that the accused persons, who are the relations of the complainant at the time of the alleged occurrence being armed with various deadly weapons forcibly entered into the land in question and started felling trees and catching fish unauthorizedly when the complainant and the members of his family tried to resist the accused persons they were filthily abuse and threatened to be killed. The accused persons also assaulted the complainant causing bleeding injuries on his person. It is the further case of the complainant that the said land lawfully belonging to their family and in support of their claim about the ownership of the properties the complainant filed several documents along with the petition of complaint. The identity of the accused persons as well as the persons, who have witnessed the occurrence and the doctors who treated the injured have been divulged in the petition of complaint. In such circumstances and considering the nature of the allegations, I do not find any fault in the impugned order. The complaint has not been dismissed. The identity of the accused persons as well as the persons, who have witnessed the occurrence and the doctors who treated the injured have been divulged in the petition of complaint. In such circumstances and considering the nature of the allegations, I do not find any fault in the impugned order. The complaint has not been dismissed. However, the court having come to a conclusion that the materials placed before it are sufficient for prosecution of the accused in terms of the provisions of chapter-XV of the Code took cognizance and refused to refer the same to the police under Section 156 (3) of the Code. (6) THE order impugned on the face of it does not suffers from any illegality or infirmity and deserve no interference. (7) THIS criminal revision has no merit and stands dismissed. Urgent xerox certified copy of this judgment, if applied for, be given to the parties, as expeditiously as possible. S. K. G.