HYDERABAD: When there is a remedy under any enactment, the High Court cannot exercise its jurisdiction under Section 482 of Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC). But in the exercise of this wholesome power, the court is entitled to quash a proceeding if it comes to the conclusion that allowing the proceeding to continue will be an abuse of the process of the court or that the ends of justice require that the proceeding ought to be quashed. The object of incorporating Section 482 of CrPC is to do justice to the parties i.e. either to the complainant or to the accused.
Coming to the conclusion that the complainant resorted to abuse of the process of the court to harass the accused to wreak vengeance against him, the High Court allowed a criminal petition filed under Section 482 of CrPC seeking quashing of the proceedings in a criminal case registered against the petitioner for the offences punishable under various sections of IPC and under Section 24 of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007.
As for the case, a woman, senior citizen, lodged a complaint with the police against her son (the petitioner), seeking registration of FIR against him and initiation of steps for clearing her plot of illegal encroachment. Basing on the complaint, police registered a case against her son. Aggrieved, he moved the High Court.
The petitioner said he was an engineer and carried on software business abroad prior to coming down to Hyderabad, and earned substantial income in the business. He purchased a plot and constructed a residential house in which he and his mother (complainant) lived happily. He also purchased another valuable plot and made payment by his personal cheques. Later, constructed some rooms on the site.
Since the urban land ceiling Act was in force at that time, his mother lent her name to act as a trustee for his minor daughter. He got the said plot registered in his mother’s name in a bona fide transaction. When she reached the house of her daughters, she started claiming ownership of the subject plot.
His mother approached the sub-divisional magistrate concerned with a plea for restoration of possession of the plot and obtained an order. He challenged the magistrate’s order before the High Court which allowed it and directed the respondent (his mother) to approach a civil court to claim the said property. Later on, she lodged complaints abusing the process of the court and the criminal law with an oblique motive to pressurise the petitioner (her son).
The petitioner told the High Court that he had bought the subject property with his earnings but obtained registered document in the name of his mother.
After hearing the petitioner’s case and perusing the material on record which included various court judgments, Justice M Satyanarayana Murthy held that the dispute was purely civil in nature and the High Court cannot record any finding with regard to the title of the property while exercising jurisdiction under Section 482 CrPC. In fact, the respondent (mother) is aware of the nature of the litigation i.e. civil litigation, but surprisingly approached the sub-divisional magistrate for relief. The decree for recovery of possession cannot be granted by a sub-divisional magistrate by exercising jurisdiction under the Act, he pointed out.
The judge made it clear that the remedy available to the respondent was to approach the competent civil court to redress her grievance.
“I am of the firm view that lodging a complaint with the police by the respondent and registration of crime against the petitioner is an abuse of the process of the court and aimed to harass the petitioner to wreak vengeance against him and, thereby, forcing him to come to terms with her instead of resorting to civil remedies which are comprehensive in nature”, the judge observed while allowing the petition.
Legal view
Civil court, not sub-divisional magistrate, should be moved over land dispute, says HC