The High Court of Punjab and Haryana declined to grant the relief sought by AAP MP Sanjay Singh against the complaint of defamation filed by Shiromani Akali Dal leader Bikram Singh Majithia alleging that the import of statements made by Sanjay Singh was that he (Bikram Singh) was involved in drug trafficking.
Brief Facts
Bikram Singh Majithia (the respondent) filed a Complaint under Section 499 IPC read with Sections 500, 501, 502 and 120-B IPC, against Sanjay Singh (the petitioner).
The respondent was a member of the Punjab Legislative Assembly and also the then serving Revenue Minister of the State, while the Petitioner Sanjay Singh was a member of the Political Affairs Committee of Aam Admi Party and was in charge of its affairs in the State of Punjab at the relevant point of time.
In his Complaint, the respondent alleged the petitioner, being Accused No.1, had made scurrilous and defamatory statements against him at a rally at Moga in the State of Punjab, which were published in the Hindustan Times newspaper by Accused Nos. 2, 3 and 4, the Editor, the Editor-in-Chief and a Reporter of the said newspaper.
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Again at a public rally at Fatehgarh Sahib (Punjab) the petitioner made similar statements about the respondent and they were also published in newspapers. The import of these statements was that he was involved in drug trafficking.
The other accused apologized before the Judicial Magistrate First Class, Ludhiana- pursuant to which the case against them was dropped and petitioner was the only person accused in the matter.
In the interim, the petitioner was elected as a Member of the Parliament (Rajya Sabha) on behalf of the Aam Admi Party from NCT Delhi. Even before this development, he filed an application before learned Magistrate at Ludhiana under Section 205 Cr.P.C., seeking exemption from appearance in the subject complaint Case- however, the application was dismissed.
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After his election to the Rajya Sabha, the petitioner again moved an such application which was also dismissed by the learned Magistrate.
The Petitioner thus approached the High Court of Punjab and Haryana High Court with the present two petitions, one of which assailed the order of dismissal of his application seeking exemption from appearance while the other one sought quashing of the Complaint pending on the file of the learned Magistrate Ludhiana.
Reasoning and Decision of the Court
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1). First Petition (Seeking exemption from appearance)
Holding the first petition to be devoid of merits, the Court observed that:
“(…) it is manifestly clear from the record that the learned Magistrate at Ludhiana was utmost liberal while dealing with the individual exemption applications filed by the petitioner. So much so, the learned Magistrate granted liberty to the petitioner to seek exemption every time the Rajya Sabha was in session.
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(...) the petitioner cannot, as a matter of right, seek exemption from appearance under Section 205 Cr.P.C. as it would essentially be within the discretion of the learned Magistrate to decide as to whether such relief should be granted to an accused in a particular case. No grounds have been made out for this Court to infer that the learned Judge erred in exercise of such judicial discretion while dismissing the application filed by the petitioner.”
The grounds urged in the 2nd petition were threefold – a) on the merits of the matter; b) on the issue of jurisdiction of the learned Magistrate at Ludhiana to entertain the complaint; and c) on the ground that the provisions of Section 202 Cr.P.C. were not complied with.
2). Second Petition (Quashing of the Complaint)
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The Court noted that no arguments were advanced either on the merits of the matter or on the issue of jurisdiction, rather the arguments were restricted only to the issue of compliance with Section 202 Cr.P.C.
Court’s observations regarding compliance with provisions of Section 202 Cr.P.C.
“Section 202 Cr.P.C. deals with postponement of issue of process.”
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“Any Magistrate, on receipt of a complaint of an offence of which he is authorized to take cognizance or which has been made over to him under Section 192, may, if he thinks fit, [and shall, in a case where the accused is residing at a place beyond the area in which he exercises his jurisdiction] postpone the issue of process against the accused, and either inquire into the case himself or direct an investigation to be made by a police officer or by such other person as he thinks fit, for the purpose of deciding whether or not there is sufficient ground for proceeding:
Provided that ......…”
“Sub-section (2) of Section 202 Cr.P.C. states that in an inquiry under sub-section (1), the Magistrate may, if he thinks fit, take evidence of witnesses on oath.”
“Section 203 Cr.P.C. deals with dismissal of a complaint and states that if, after considering the statements on oath (if any) of the complainant and of the witnesses and the result of the inquiry or investigation (if any) under Section 202Cr.P.C., the Magistrate is of opinion that there is no sufficient ground for proceeding, he shall dismiss the complaint, and in every such case he shall briefly record his reasons for so doing.”
With respect to the present case, the Court observed that:
“(…) the petitioner, now the sole accused in the complaint case, was admittedly a resident of New Delhi at that point of time and was therefore residing beyond the area of jurisdiction of the learned Magistrate at Ludhiana.”
“In consequence, the provisions of Section 202 Cr.P.C. had to be compulsorily complied with. The issue to be addressed is whether the learned Magistrate complied with the mandate of this provision before passing the summoning order.”
‘Compulsory’ inquiry/ investigation
“After the amendment of Section 202 Cr.P.C., it is mandatory for the Magistrate concerned to conduct an inquiry or cause an investigation before issuing process if the accused resides beyond his area of jurisdiction.”
In the light of the aforestated legal principles, the Court tested the impugned summoning order, and while doing so- made the following observations:
“Perusal thereof reflects that the learned Magistrate at Ludhiana took into account the preliminary evidence that had been recorded at the stage when the complaint was received.”
“Thus having satisfied himself on all these aspects, the learned Magistrate summoned the accused to face trial. The summoning order clearly demonstrates application of mind by the learned Magistrate at Ludhiana and all relevant issues were duly considered by him before issuing process.”
Held
Declining the relief sought in both the petitions, the Court held that:
“This Court therefore finds that the summoning order was passed after due compliance with the requirements of Section 202 Cr.P.C. and there was no violation of the mandate of this statutory provision.
Thus, this Court finds that no grounds made out in either of the petitions warranting interference with the impugned orders passed by the learned Judicial Magistrate First Class, Ludhiana, in relation to Complaint No.69 of 2016. No separate grounds were argued or established for quashing the subject complaint.”
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Case Details
Case Name: Sanjay Singh v. Bikram Singh Majithia
Case No.: CRM-M-30800-2019, CRM-M-42786-2019
Date: 03.12.2020
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