IMPORTANT POINT
A company, having several branches has to file complaint at a place where transaction had taken place, cheque was drawn, presented and dishonoured.

J.H. Bhatia, J.— Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith. Heard the learned Counsel for the parties.

2. This group of application filed under Section 482 of CrPC the processes issued by the Metropolitan Magistrate, 33rd Court, Ballard Pier. Mumbai under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act against the applicants in different complaint cases, are sought to be quashed on the ground that the Magistrate at Mumbai has no jurisdiction.

3. The respondent No.1 has filed different complaint cases under Section 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act against the accused No.1/respondent No.2 Nanesh Foods Ltd. (formerly known as Samta Foods Ltd.) and its directors. The present applicants are the accused Nos. 4 and 5 and they are also said to be directors of said Nanesh Foods Ltd. According to the complainant, it is a registered company having its head office at Fort, in Mumbai. It had advanced cash credit facility, term loan facility and working capital loan facility to the accused No.1 company. In discharge of part of the liability, said company had issued cheques in favour of the complainant. Those cheques were dishonoured on presentation and in spite of service of statutory notice, the company and its directors had failed to make payment. Therefore, the complaints were filed in the Court of Metropolitan Magistrate, Ballard Pier, Mumbai.

4. The petitioners have contended that the complainant/respondent No. 1 has its Head Office at Mumbai and has a network of branches all over the country. The accused No.1 Nanesh Foods Ltd. is situated in Madhya Pradesh and the directors are also residing at Indore. Whole of the transaction had taken place at Indore. The agreement for the said loans and cash credit facility was also executed at Indore. The cheques in question were also drawn by the accused No.1 company in favour of the complainant on its account maintained with Andhra Bank, Jawahar Nagar Branch, Indore. The cheques were presented and dishonoured by the drawee Bank at Indore. Only the notice was issued by the complainant from Mumbai, where its head office is situated. It is contended that merely because the head office of the complainant is situated at Mumbai and notice was issued from Mumbai, the Magistrate at Mumbai does not get jurisdiction.

5. On the other hand, the learned Counsel for the complainant/respondent No.1 vehemently contended that the cheques were deposited by the complainant with its bankers i.e. HDFC Bank, Kanjurmarg Mumbai and the cheques were presented to Andhra Bank Cheque Processing Centre, Mumbai and the cheques were dishonoured by Andhra Bank Cheque Processing Centre, Mumbai and intimation of the same was also given by Andhra Bank from Mumbai to the head office of the complainant at Mumbai. After that the complainant issued notices from its head office at Mumbai making demand at Mumbai which the accused persons failed to comply and to make the payment and as part of the transaction had taken place at Mumbai, the Metropolitan Magistrate at Mumbai has got jurisdiction.

6. In K. Bhaskaran v. Sankaran Vaidhyan Balan & Anr.1 the Court had observed thus in paras 14, 15 and 16:

“14. The offence under Section 138 of the Act can be completed only with the concatenation of a number of acts. The following are the acts which are components of the said offence: (1) drawing of the cheque, (2) presentation of the cheque to the bank, (3) returning the cheque unpaid by the drawee bank, (4) giving notice in writing to the drawer of the cheque demanding payment of the cheque amount, (5) failure of the drawer to make payment within 15 days of the receipt of the notice.

15. It is not necessary that all the above five acts should have been perpetrated at the same locality. It is possible that each of those five acts could be done at five different localities. But a concatenation of all the above five is a sine qua non for the completion of the offence under Section 138 of the Code. In this context a reference to Section 178(