Point of Law: In backdrop of interpretation of various relevant provisions of Code under Chapter XIV and of principles of law enunciated by this Court in a series of decisions relating to exercise of extraordinary power under Article 226 or the inherent powers under Section 482 of Code which we have extracted and reproduced above, we give the following categories of cases by way of illustration wherein such power could be exercised either to prevent abuse of the process of Court or otherwise to secure ends of justice, though it may not be possible to lay down any precise, clearly defined and sufficiently channelized and inflexible guidelines or rigid formulae and to give an exhaustive list of myriad kinds of cases wherein such power should be exercised.

ORDER :

1. The two petitioners herein seek quashment of FIR dated 07/12/2012 in Crime No. 178/2017 registered at Police Station Batauli, Distt. Surguja for offences punishable under Sections 420, 467, 468, 471 read with Section 34 of the IPC and Section 120B of the IPC and Sections 3(1)(p½¼N), 3(2)(v)( d) of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.

2. The challenge in the instant petition has been made on the following factual backdrop :

2.1. That, Gaya Prasad S/o Vishwanath, Balgovind S/o Shobhnath and Satyanarayan S/o Shobhnath through their power of attorney holder namely Vinay Kumar Soni executed two sale deeds dated 16/09/2010 in favour of Sanjeev Sharma, Deputy General Manager, Ultratech Cement Ltd thereby, transferring the subject land in his favour on the premise that they are the titleholders of the subject land and they are competent to alienate the said subject land and in which the present two petitioners stood as witnesses by attesting the sale deeds.

2.2. Subsequently, complaint was made to the Collector that the said land was not owned by the sellers named above and it is Government land/land held by aboriginal tribes, which could not have been sold without the permission of the Collector under Sections 165(6) & 165(7b) of the Chhattisgarh Land Revenue Code, 1959 (hereinafter, 'the Land Revenue Code') and it further could not have been registered by the Sub-Registrar in view of the express bar contained in Section 165(10) of the Land Revenue Code.

2.3. Accordingly, the Collector, Sarguja initiated revenue proceedings and by order dated 26/11/2012 held that the transaction made on the strength of the aforesaid two sale deeds are null and void and it does not confer any title upon the purchaser namely Sanjeev Sharma, Deputy General Manager, Ultratech Cement Ltd. It was also held that the said sale deeds could not have been registered and further held that the petitioners, who stood as attesting witnesses during the execution of the sale deeds, are also responsible for registration of those sale deeds, and directed the Sub-Divisional Officer, Sarguja to lodge an FIR against the purchaser therein as well as the petitioners along with the sellers, pursuant to which an FIR has been lodged and the petitioners too have been charged with the aforesaid offences which has been called in question in the instant petition filed under Section 482 of CrPC.

3. Mr. Dev Ashish Biswas, learned counsel for the petitioners, would submit that the petitioners merely stood as attesting witnesses during the execution of the two sale deeds dated 16/09/2010 and as such, they cannot be held responsible for commission of the aforesaid offences as they have simply attested the signatures of the sellers mentioned in the sale deeds and that would not attract any criminal liability. He would rely upon the decisions rendered by the Privy Council in the matters of Banga Chandra Dhur Biswas v. Jagat Kishore Acharjya Chowdhuri, AIR 1916 Privy Council 110 and Pandurang Krishnaji v. M. Tukaram, AIR 1922 Privy Council 20 to buttress his submission that the attestation of a deed by itself estops a man from denying nothing whatsoever except that he has witnessed the execution of the deed or that he knew of its contents or that he consented to the transaction which the document effects and as such, merely on the basis of the attestation of the sale deeds, no criminal liability can be fastened upon the petitioners. He would further submit no offences are made out against the petitioners and prosecution against the petitioners is nothing but sheer abuse of the process of the Court, therefore, the FIR lodged against the petitioners deserves to be quashed.

4. Mr. Jitendra Pali, learned Deputy Advocate General for the respondents/State, would submit that though the petitioners stood as witnesses during the execution of the sale deeds, but the aforesaid offences have been registered against them including offence under Section 1