Anil Ahluwalia Petition Dismissed: Delhi High Court Says Gross Injustice Required for Section 528 BNSS

The Delhi High Court has firmly closed the door on a petitioner attempting to use its inherent powers under Section 528 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) as a "backdoor entry" after his revision petition was dismissed. Justice Girish Kathpalia ruled that such extraordinary powers can only be invoked if the case involves gross injustice or a grave miscarriage of justice.

A Tragic Loss During the Pandemic

The case stems from the death of Anil Ahluwalia's wife in April 2021 at a private hospital in Delhi. According to the complaint, his wife was suffering from COVID-19 and had difficulty breathing. The petitioner alleged that after being turned away by Max Super Speciality Hospital due to lack of beds, he took her to another hospital (the respondent hospital). There, he claimed, staff demanded Rs 1 lakh in cash for admission, charged exorbitant amounts for Remdesivir injections, and twice stopped her oxygen supply. She passed away on the evening of April 27, 2021.

When local police failed to register an FIR, Ahluwalia filed a complaint under Section 156(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (now Section 175(3) BNSS) along with a private complaint under Section 200 CrPC. The magistrate, after reviewing a police status report and Delhi Medical Council findings, dismissed the application for police investigation, concluding that the petitioner already knew the identity and specific roles of the accused. The case was posted for pre-summoning evidence. Ahluwalia's revision petition before the Sessions Court was also dismissed, prompting him to approach the High Court under Section 528 BNSS.

"Backdoor Entry" Not Allowed

The core legal question was whether the High Court could exercise its inherent powers under Section 528 BNSS when the petitioner had already availed and lost the remedy of revision under Section 438 BNSS. Section 438(3) explicitly bars a second revision petition once one has been filed.

Justice Kathpalia drew heavily on his own earlier judgment in Exclusive Capital Ltd. vs State, Government of NCT Delhi (2026), which established that "what is explicitly prohibited by law cannot be allowed backdoor entry by invoking inherent powers ." The court noted that this principle has a narrow exception: where the High Court is satisfied that there is gross injustice , abuse of process, or a comparable exceptional circumstance.

The petitioner, represented by Advocate Paranjay Chopra, argued that the revision and inherent jurisdictions operate in different fields. He relied on Supreme Court precedents in Krishnan & Anr. vs Krishnaveni & Anr. and Dhariwal Tobacco Products Ltd. vs State of Maharashtra to contend that a litigant should not be barred from seeking inherent relief simply because he had already filed a revision.

Only Gross Injustice Can Open the Door

The court carefully analyzed these precedents. In Krishnan , the Supreme Court had observed that while the inherent powers of the High Court are very wide, they must be exercised sparingly and cautiously where the Sessions Judge has already exercised revisional powers — and only where there is a grave miscarriage of justice. The Dhariwal case dealt with a different question (whether a petitioner can be turned away from Section 482 merely because an alternative revision remedy exists) and was found inapplicable to the present situation where the petitioner had already exhausted that remedy.

Justice Kathpalia then framed the decisive test: had the petitioner been rendered "remediiless" after the dismissal of his revision petition? If so, the High Court might step in to prevent a failure of justice. Here, the court answered firmly in the negative: Ahluwalia's complaint was still pending before the magistrate, and he could proceed to lead pre-summoning evidence. The door to justice remained open.

"Grant of directions to register FIR and investigate here would be gross injustice to the accused persons, who would be arm-twisted on the basis of those directions and would be compelled to settle what appears to be only a civil dispute, synthetically tainted with criminality ," the court observed, paraphrasing its earlier ruling.

Key Observations

  • "What is explicitly prohibited by law cannot be allowed backdoor entry by invoking inherent powers ."
  • "When the High Court on examination of the record finds that there is grave miscarriage of justice or abuse of the process of the courts... it is but the duty of the High Court to have it corrected at the inception."
  • "The present is not a case of gross injustice or rarest of rare case , in which this court can justifiably invoke inherent powers , which powers have to be exercised sparingly."
  • "The petitioner is already before a court of competent jurisdiction, where his complaint is already pending for pre-summoning evidence."

Petition Dismissed

Justice Kathpalia concluded that the present case did not meet the high threshold required for invoking inherent powers. The petition was dismissed as not maintainable. The ruling reinforces a clear message: litigants cannot use Section 528 BNSS to get a second bite at the cherry after losing in revision, unless they can demonstrate that the lower courts' orders have left them with no other remedy and that a grave injustice would otherwise ensue.

For Anil Ahluwalia, the legal battle continues before the magistrate, where his complaint will be tested through pre-summoning evidence — a process the High Court found to be a perfectly adequate remedy.