IMPORTANT POINTS
(1) Casteist abuses and criminal intimidation – Place of occurrence must be one “within public view” which is a sine qua non for making out offence under SC/ST Act.
(2) Quashing of criminal case – Contents of complaint giving initial and primary description could be treated as more reliable, for, at subsequent stage, there would be scope and room for improvisation.

JUDGMENT

N.V. ANJARIA, J.

Leave granted.

2. The challenge in this appeal is directed against judgment and order dated 22.08.2024 passed by the High Court of Delhi at New Delhi¹[Hereinafter, “High Court”.], dismissing Criminal Revision Petition No.114 of 2023 and Criminal Miscellaneous Application No.3181 of 2023, filed by the appellants-accused herein.

2.1 In the Criminal Revision Petition, what was called in question, was the order passed by the Court of Additional Sessions Judge-02, Tis Hazari Court, Delhi²[Hereinafter, “trial court”.] dated 26.11.2022 on framing of charges as well as order dated 30.11.2022, whereby the charges were framed. Against appellant No.1-accused No.1 Smt. Gunjan @ Girija Kumari w/o Shri Laxman Dass, charge came to be framed by the trial court in respect of the offences under Sections 3(1)(r) and 3(1)(s) of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989³[Hereinafter, “SC/ST Act”.], whereas against all the appellants-accused including appellant No.1, charge was also framed under Section 506 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860⁴[Hereinafter, “IPC”.]. The prayer of the appellants to quash the said orders was rejected and the Criminal Revision Petition came to be dismissed by the High Court.

3. The complainant and the accused persons happen to be family members. Appellant Nos.2 and 3 and respondent No.2-complainant are real brothers. Appellant Nos.1 and 4 are legally wedded wives of appellant Nos.2 and 3 respectively. The wives hail from castes other than Scheduled Castes or Scheduled Tribes. Their husbands, that is appellant Nos.2 and 3 as well as respondent No.2-complainant, belong to Scheduled Castes. By virtue of marriage, the wives, it was contended, also stood to belong to caste and community of their husband’s as well as that of respondent No.2-complainant. The facts on record and the pleadings suggest that a dispute existed between the parties in respect of the properties of their late father named Shri Nand Kishore, situated at Hari Nagar and Ramesh Nagar.

3.1 First Information Report⁵[Hereinafter, “FIR”.] No.42 of 2021 came to be registered on 30.01.2021 with the Kirti Nagar Police Station, pursuant to a complaint lodged by respondent No.2-complainant. It was inter-alia stated that on the day of the incident, that is on 28.01.2021, the appellants misbehaved with the complainant. According to the complainant, appellant No.1 hurled casteist abuses against respondent No.2-complainant and the other appellants gave threats.

3.1.1 It was stated in the complaint that when the friends of respondent No.2-complainant named Chandra Prakash @ Chini and Bobby had come to meet him, appellant No.1, by making caste-based slurs, using words like chura, chamar, harijan, dirty drain etc., addressed and insulted the complainant and his wife. It was stated that the accused were trying to break open the lock of the house when the incident took place.

3.1.2 The narration in the complaint was prefaced by mentioning that appellant No.1, who belonged to a particular upper caste, was in the habit of using abusive words as above and that it was for over one year that appellant No.1 had been harassing by addressing the complainant, his wife and their child with derogatory words as above, from her balcony or from the ground floor in the house particularly when some friends or other persons would come.

3.2 The complaint resulted into registration of FIR as above, culminating into Sessions Case being SC No. 253 of 2021 upon completion of the investigation. The trial court, in its order dated 26.11.2022, viewed that the charges were required to be framed. It actually framed the charges as per order dated 30.11.2022 under Sections 3(1)(r) and 3(1)(s) of the SC/ST Act against appellant No.1 and under Section 506 read with Section 34, IPC against all the appellants. The High Court rejected the challenge to the said orders and maintained the charges by the impugned judgment and order.

3.3 Accor