U. Durga Prasad Rao, J.

In these two petitions filed under Section 482 Cr.P.C, the Accused Nos.1 and 2 petitioners in Crl.P.No.5020 of 2014 and A.3 to A.11 petitioners in Crl.P.No.5993 of 2014 seek to quash the proceedings in C.C.No.1757 of 2013 on the file of III Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, City Criminal Courts at Hyderabad.

2. On the private complaint filed by the complainant, the learned III Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate took cognizance of the case for the offences under Sections 406, 418, 409, 420 and 120-B IPC against the accused.

3. The brief facts of the case are that the complainant entered into a contract with Google India Private Limited on 14.05.2010 for providing services including designing and development of websites and to assist Google develop "Getting Global Business Online" etc., which was terminated on 31.07.2013. While so, the Google India Private Limited wanted to have a single partner to look after the global operations and preferred the accused No.1 (Cognizant Technology Solutions India Private Limited) to deal with all other players in the field. Accused Nos. 1 and 2 authorised its employees A.3 to A.11, who started negotiating with one of the Directors of the complainant company namely B. Bharathi. The complainant in good faith submitted the confidential employee data to the accused on 24.04.2013 by email pending settlement of the terms and conditions of the contract with accused No.1 and after receiving the data, the accused No.1 backed out of the agreement as expressed through Accused No.8 vide email dated 30.05.2013. Accused Nos. 1 to 11 started alluring and poaching the employees of the complainant company bypassing the complainant. One of such employee, who was poached by the accused was Mr. David, who revealed about the efforts made by the accused to the complainant. Investigation is reported to be pending.

4 (a) Denying FIR allegations, learned counsel for petitioners argued that talks with complainant and accused were continuing and at that time the complainant had only provided the billing rate and CTC associates and it had not provided any specific details, names and contact numbers of its employees and subsequently, as no consensus was reached on payment terms, the accused company backed out of the contract. Therefore, the question of accused company obtaining confidential information relating to the employees of the complainant company and later on alluring and poaching the employees does not arise. Sofaras the episode of David is concerned, the said David attended a walk-in interview to get the job in the company of accused and therefore, the question of accused poaching either David or some other employees is a myth.

4 (b) Learned counsel alternatively argued that even assuming that the complainant company shared confidential data of its employees with accused company and accused tried to bait the employees of the complainant, that act will not amount to any offence because inviting the skilled and expert employees of one organisation by another organisation by offering better package will not amount to an offence under any of the laws. On such offer the employees may or may not be willing to leave their present employment to join in another organization. He vehemently argued that trial Court erred in taking cognizance of the case though the complaint allegations did not make out any offence and therefore, continuation of criminal case will amount to abuse of process of law. He thus prayed to quash the proceedings.

5. Per contra, learned counsel for 1st respondent/complainant argued that accused company contacted the complainant through a number of e-mails and accused made representations as if they are going to have a contract with the complainant i.e. Google Company and when the talks were in the mid way the accused sought for the confidential employees date and out of trust and hope that accused will enter into a contract the complainant entrusted the confiden