The main legal point established is the justification for splitting proceedings and representation of the accused company by the official liquidator, as well as the refusal of a delayed and vague request for further cross-examination.

JUDGMENT :

1. In the three revisional applications, the judgments delivered by the Additional District and Sessions Judge, Fast Track Second Court, Bichar Bhavan, Calcutta, in revisional applications pertaining to complaints against the accused/petitioners u/s 138/141 of the Negotiable Instruments Act 1881 are under challenge.

2. The opposite parties lodged complaints against the accused company Indage Vinters Limited and the petitioners who are the former Chairman, former Managing Director, former V.P Finance and former Chief Financial Officer of the company respectively. The cases are pending before the court of the Learned Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Calcutta for examination of the petitioners u/s 313 of the Code. The petitioners moved applications u/s 311 of the Code before the Trial Court for recalling the sole witness for cross examining him further on the ground that there was a change of learned advocate in the mean time and the newly appointed learned advocate intended to further cross-examine the witness on some vital issues. Attention of the Court was also drawn to the order of the Bombay High Court in company petition no. 960/2009 whereby the accused company was ordered to be wound up and official liquidator appointed vide order dated March 19, 2010. The trial court, after consideration of the contention of the petitioners, rejected their prayers u/s 311 of the Code and issued notice upon the official liquidator for representation of the accused company. The trial court split up the proceedings of the cases and fixed a date for examination of the present petitioners u/s 313 of the Code besides awaiting response from the official liquidator. The said orders dated 06-11-2017 in the three cases were assailed by the petitioners before the revisional court.

3. The other order under challenge was passed on 10-01-2018 whereby the trial court allowed the prayer for adjournment of the petitioners as a last chance and directed the parties to come prepared on the next date of hearing.

4. The revisional court, by the impugned judgments, dismissed the applications of the petitioners and affirmed the orders of the trial court. The petitioners have preferred the present revisions against the said judgments of the revisional court.

5. It is trite law that more than one order of a particular court which have some nexus with one another can be challenged by way of a single revisional application. In the cases in hand, no substantive order was passed on 10-01-2018 which warranted a revision. The record clearly indicates that the petitioners were in fact aggrieved by the orders dated 06-11-2017. The said orders were not challenged by the petitioners within the statutory period of time. Certain observations made in the impugned judgments are relevant. The revisional court observed that only the orders dated 10-01-2018 were challenged in the cause title of the applications before the said court and order dated 06-11-2017 was deliberately not mentioned so as to get the revisional application admitted without praying for condonation of delay in filing the same. The revision with regard to order dated 06-11-2017 was obviously barred by limitation and the petitioners very cleverly combined the subsequent orders dated 10-01- 2018 in the application in order to bypass the rigours of the Limitation Act. The least that the petitioners should have done was to pray for condonation of delay in filing the application before the revisional court. Instead, they chose to use the orders dated 10-01-2018 by tagging the same with the earlier orders despite the fact that the orders dated 10-01-2018 required no interference at all. Be that as it may, as the cases are pending for a pretty long time, the revisional applications ought to be disposed of on merit in the interest of justice and not remanded back to the first revisional court merely on the ground of limitation.

6. On merits, the petitioners have assailed the impugned judgments on several counts. Opp