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ANDHRA PRADESH HIGH COURT AT AMARAVATI
D. Ramesh, J.
Jaydeep Madhukar Wakankar – Appellant
Versus
State of Andhra Pradesh & Ors. – Respondents
Criminal Petition Nos. 6284 and 6285 of 2021
Decided On : 13-07-2022
CRIMINAL PETITIONS - QUASHING OF PROCEEDINGS - INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ACT, 2000 - SECTIONS 43, 65, 66, 66B, 66D - INDIAN PENAL CODE, 1860 - SECTIONS 204, 120B - COMPANY NOT MADE A PARTY - NO SPECIFIC ALLEGATIONS - INGREDIENTS OF OFFENCES NOT MET - PRINCIPLE OF ATTRIBUTION - FURTHER INVESTIGATION - SECTION 173(8) CR.P.C. - SECTION 319 CR.P.C. - DISCHARGE APPLICATION - SECTION 227 CR.P.C.
Fact of the Case:
Petitioners, Vice President, Finance and Designated Partner of All Scripts (India) LLP, and Director, Information Systems at Allscripts (India) LLP, respectively, challenged the proceedings initiated against them under the Information Technology Act, 2000 and the Indian Penal Code, alleging that they were implicated as accused due to the inability of the cybercrime police to proceed against the US-based Allscripts Healthcare, LLC and its employees. They contended that there was an ongoing litigation between Allscripts Healthcare, LLC and the defacto complainant in the US, that the SOW was entered between Allscripts Healthcare, LLC and the defacto complainant, and that they were not involved in the alleged offenses.
Finding of the Court:
The court held that there was no impediment to adding the petitioners as accused even though the company was not made a co-accused, as Section 173(8) of the Cr.P.C. empowers the authorities to conduct further investigation and file a further report, and Section 319 of the Cr.P.C. empowers the Magistrate to proceed against any person who appears to have committed an offense, even if that person is not the accused. The court also noted that the petitioners could file a discharge application under Section 227 of the Cr.P.C. if they believed that the allegations against them were false and that there was no prima facie case against them.
Issues: 1. Whether the proceedings against the petitioners should be quashed on the ground that the company was not made a party? 2. Whether there were specific allegations against the petitioners in the complaint and charge sheet? 3. Whether the ingredients of the offenses alleged against the petitioners were met?
Ratio Decidendi: 1. The court held that there was no requirement to make the company a co-accused in order to proceed against the petitioners, as the principle of attribution allows for the prosecution of human agents of a body corporate when the body corporate knows or forms an intention through its human agents. 2. The court held that the allegations in the complaint and charge sheet were vague and did not contain any specific overt acts against the petitioners. 3. The court held that the ingredients of the offenses alleged against the petitioners were not met, as there was no evidence of specific acts committed by the petitioners that would satisfy the essential elements of the offenses.
Final Decision: The court dismissed both criminal petitions and granted the petitioners liberty to file discharge applications under Section 227 of the Cr.P.C. before the trial court. The court directed the trial court to dispose of any such applications expeditiously within one month, without being influenced by the observations made by the court in the present petitions.
JUDGMENT
D. Ramesh, J. - Since these criminal petitions arise out of the same crime, both the petitions are being disposed of together with a common order.
2. These two criminal petitions are filed under Section 482 Cr.P.C. seeking to quash the proceedings in C.C. 3515 of 2021 (arising out of FIR No. 91/2021 dated 12.06.2021) on the file of Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Court, Vishakhapatnam in taking cognizance of offences under Sections 43, 65, 66, 66B, 66D of the Information Technology Act, 2000 and Section 204, 120B of IPC.
3. Heard Sri Siddharth Luthra and Sri Dammalaptai Srinivas, learned senior counsel appearing for Sri V. Vimal Varma and Sri Ginjupalli Subba Rao, learned counsel appearing for the petitioners/A1 and A2 respectively, Sri Dusyanth Reddy, learned Special Public Prosecutor appearing for the respondents 1 and 2, and learned senior counsel Sri Naga Mutthu, and Sri D. Purna Chandra Reddy, learned counsel appearing for the respondent No. 3/defacto complainant.
4. The main contents of the complaint made by M/s. Mahathi Software Pvt. Ltd./defacto complainant [Respondent No. 3 herein] are that M/s. Allscripts abruptly terminated the MOU with a notice on the 14th May, 2021, thereafter it has breached the privacy of the complainant Company by illegally accessing the servers and removed the subscription and potentially confidential data and further disabled administrative access of complainant's to its own Azure Tenant from the Complainant's office at Vizag by obtaining global admin privileges to Complainant's tenant, for illegal gains.
5. Main allegations in the charge sheet are that M/s. Mahathi Software Pvt. Ltd./defacto complainant entered in to an agreement [Statement of Work (SOW)] with 'ALLSCRIPTS' on 18.05.2018. i.e. between M/s. Mahathi Software Pvt. Ltd./defacto complainant and M/s. Allscripts. As per the SOW, M/s. Mahathi Software Pvt. Ltd./defacto complainant will provide mobile application development and IT services to M/s. Allscripts. The term of the SOW was for a period of 3 years i.e., from 18.05.2018 to 17.05.2020.
6. On 14.05.2021 M/s./All Scripts sent a mail from kim.franks@allscripts.com to their MD Dr. C. Padhmavathi's mail ID and another mail ID stating that they are terminating the said SOW. M/s. Mahathi Software Pvt. Ltd. uses AZURE Cloud computing services to run their company's and clients' confidential data and other services. M/s. Mahathi Software Pvt. Ltd./defacto complainant provided 'Global Admin Privileges' to the Allscripts for administrative convince.
7. That Allscripts and its officials on 14-05-2021, without M/s. Mahathi Software Pvt. Ltd./defacto complainant company's permission accessed company's user accounts and removed administrative access and removed their User Interface Layout and the intellectual property of M/s. Mahathi Software Pvt. Ltd. from 14-05-2021 to 20-05-2021, the LW.1 company/3rd respondent could not access their data and confidential information, after that they came to Cyber Crime Police Station and lodged a complaint. The petitioner in Crl. P. No. 6284 of 2021 is arrayed as accused No. 1 and the petitioner in Crl. P. No. 6285 of 2021 is arrayed as accused No. 2 in the charge sheet.
8. The contention of the Petitioner in Crl. P. No. 6284 is that the petitioner is the Vice President, Finance and Designated Partner of All Scripts (India) LLP formed by a Limited Liability Partnership Agreement between Allscripts Healthcare IT (Mauritius) and Allscripts Healthcare International Holdings LLC. Further, he is not a Managing Partner as stated in the charge sheet but a Designated Partner. Neither he nor the Allscripts (India) LLP have entered into any agreement with the Respondent No. 3.
9. In Crl. P. No. 6285 of 2021, the contention of the petitioner is that the petitioner/accused No. 2 is the Director, Information Systems at Allscripts (India) LLP and is primarily concerned with desktop and network services and corporate server maintenance for Allscripts (India) LLP, and tha
The court emphasized the importance of procedural compliance and the distinction between civil and criminal liability in cases involving business disputes and misuse of information.
Creation of a fake website constitutes a cybercrime that misleads individuals into financial fraud, warranting criminal prosecution.
The court emphasized that allegations of cyber fraud, which involve criminal culpability, cannot be dismissed as mere civil disputes, thereby mandating continuance of criminal proceedings.
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