A director's mere position does not establish criminal liability; there must be evidence of active involvement and intent in the alleged offense for summoning to be justified.

JUDGMENT

Asha Menon, J.

1. This petition has been filed under Section 482 of the Cr.P.C. for quashing of criminal proceedings and summoning order dated 17th January, 2020 passed by the Ld. Special Judge (PC Act), CBI, RACC/New Delhi in CBI case No.412/2019 titled as CBI Versus Chanchal Ghosh and Others under Section 120B IPC read with Sections 420/465/471 IPC and under Section 13(2) read with Section 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 pending before the Special Judge, CBI.

2. The facts as relevant for the disposal of this case are that various persons were found to have defrauded the Corporation Bank, Vasant Vihar branch, New Delhi. A chargesheet was filed against seven accused persons but the petitioners were shown in column No.12. The learned Special Judge, vide the impugned order dated 17th January, 2020, summoned all the seven accused persons including the petitioners to face trial.

3. Mr. Atul Jha, learned counsel for the petitioners submitted that the petitioners were not involved in the day-to-day functioning of the company, M/s Unitrack Logistics Private Limited, of which they were no doubt, the named directors, but in actual fact, they were housewives and, therefore, there being no grounds to summon them in a conspiracy of accused Mr. Chanchal Ghosh, with the accused bank officials to siphon off funds from the bank, they ought not to be subjected to the torment of a trial. It was submitted that when the chargesheet had named them as unsummoned accused, specific reasons ought to have been given by the learned Trial Court before summoning the petitioners, whereas no such reasons were given. Reliance has been placed on the judgments of the Supreme Court in Shiv Kumar Jatia v. State (NCT of Delhi), (2019) 17 SCC 193 and Sunil Bharti Mittal v. CBI, (2015) 4 SCC 609 in this regard. It was therefore submitted that the impugned order was liable to be set aside.

4. It was submitted by the learned counsel on merits that the loan was guaranteed by one Mr. Deepinder Singh whose immovable property being a Farm House at Chhattarpur worth Rs. 28 crores had also been attached and as per the chargesheet, the loan amount was recovered, leaving a balance of Rs. 5,84,846/-. In these circumstances, on merits too, the petitioners ought not to be subjected to a trial. Hence, it was prayed that the proceedings and the summoning order qua the petitioners be quashed.

5. The respondent/CBI has filed its reply. It is also submitted by Mr. Prashant Varma, learned SPP for the respondent/CBI that this Court ought not to quash the proceedings inasmuch as no error or perversity in the impugned order has been pointed out. It is also submitted that the learned Trial Court had rightly observed that the petitioners were the only Directors of the Company which had obtained the loan from the Corporation Bank and that they had also furnished their guarantees, as a result of which, it could not be said that they were not liable for the defrauding of the bank. Hence, it was prayed that the petition be dismissed.

6. In Shiv Kumar Jatia (supra), placed on the record as Annexure P- 4, following the decision in Sunil Bharti Mittal (supra), placed on record as Annexure P-3, the Supreme Court had held that an order of summoning, though need not be too detailed, must specify in respect of each accused, why they were being summoned. In Sunil Bharti Mittal (supra), the Supreme Court held that before an accused is to be summoned, an active role must be assigned to the accused. That active role must be also accompanied with a cr