The High Court's inherent power under Section 482 of CRPC cannot be denied without a statutory bar, and its refusal to entertain a petition must be justified.

ORDER :

Application for impleadment is allowed.

2. Leave granted.

3. Heard the learned senior counsel appearing for the appellants and the learned counsel who represents the informant.

4. A complaint was filed by the respondent in his capacity as the Labour Inspector Grade I before the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, SAS Nagar. The allegation is that the appellants have violated Section 25-O of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (for short, "1947 Act") and therefore they have committed offence punishable under Section 25-R of the 1947 Act. Cognizance was taken of the complaint by the learned Magistrate.

5. A petition under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for short, "CRPC") was filed by the appellants seeking quashing of the complaint on various grounds stated therein. The High Court by the impugned judgment held that a petition under Section 482 of the CRPC was not maintainable and the remedy of the appellants was to take recourse to Section 397 of the CRPC by way of a Revision Application for challenging the order issuing process.

6. We have examined the grounds taken in the petition under Section 482 of the CRPC. Apart from the ground taken that no case was made out to take cognizance of the offence, the appellants have relied upon several factual aspects which are not part of the complaint or part of the material produced along with the complaint.

7. The power of the High Court under Section 482 of the CRPC is an inherent power. Unless there is a statutory bar for exercise of that power, the High Court cannot come to a conclusion that a petition under Section 482 of the CRPC was not maintainable. In a given case, where a prayer for quashing summoning order is based only on the ground that the averments made in the complaint and the documents produced with the complaint do not make out a case for taking cognizance, possibly the High Court in its discretion can decline to entertain a petition under Section 482 of the CRPC and relegate the petitioner to the remedy of filing a revision application. But in the facts of the case, considering the challenge in the petition under Section 482 of the CRPC, the view taken by the High Court was not justified.

8. Accordingly, only on that ground, we set aside the impugned order and restore CRM-M No.19079 of 2019 to the file of the High Court of the Punjab and Haryana at Chandigarh. The restored petition shall be listed for directions before the roster Bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court on 24th February, 2025 in the morning when the parties represented today shall be under an obligation to appear and no further notice shall be served by the High Court to them.

9. Till the disposal of the restored petition, the interim order passed by this Court on 5th August, 2019 will continue to operate.

10. We make it clear that all questions are left open to be decided by the High Court.

11. The appeal is partly allowed on the above terms.