CHENNAI: Holding that criminal courts should ensure that proceedings before it are not used for settling scores or to pressurise parties to settle civil disputes, the Madras High Court quashed a complaint from a farmer and the subsequent proceedings pending before a police station in Coimbatore.
Justice G K Ilanthiraiyan made the observation and set aside the proceedings, while allowing two criminal original petitions from Pavankumar and six others, on May 8.
In his complaint, S Palanisamy, an agriculturist, claimed that he owned 1.10 acre at Vilankurichi and one Pavankumar grabbed his land and sold it to another person. He had also filed a civil suit in this connection in 2016. However, Pavankumar claimed that he had obtained an ex-parte decree, mutated all the revenue records in his favour and sold the properties to six other accused, Palanisamy alleged.
Rejecting the plea, the judge said that the entire issues are civil in nature and there is no iota of evidence to constitute any of the offence as registered by the Coimbatore police. The complaint is nothing but a clear case of abuse of process of court and it cannot be sustained against the petitioners, the judge said.