The court emphasized that a complaint under Section 340 Cr.PC requires a finding of expediency in the interest of justice, not merely a conclusion of false evidence.

JUDGMENT

[CRL.A Nos.2414/2024 and 70/2025]

These appeals raise identical questions of law and can therefore be conveniently disposed of by a common judgment.

2. These appeals are filed under Section 341 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, challenging the proceedings against the appellants under Section 340 Cr.PC in OP(MV) No.921/2009 on the file of the III Additional District Court/ II Additional Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal, Thrissur (hereinafter referred to as the ‘MACT’).

3. The brief facts are as follows:

OP(MV) No.921/2009 was one filed by legal heirs of one Ayyappan, who succumbed to injuries sustained in a road traffic accident. The petition showed one Prakasan to be the owner cum driver of the offending motorcycle and he was impleaded as the 1^st respondent. The United India Insurance Company Ltd., which was impleaded as the 2^nd respondent in the petition before the MACT, took up a contention that the offending motorcycle was not driven by the aforesaid Prakasan, but by one Nimesh. It was contended that the aforesaid Nimesh had no licence to drive a motorcycle, and in order to ensure that the claim was met by the Insurance Company, it was falsely projected that the motorcycle was driven by the aforesaid Prakasan. In order to prove its contention, the Insurance Company cited the appellants herein as witnesses. The appellants deposed before the MACT that they were eyewitnesses to the accident and they had seen the aforesaid Prakasan riding the motorcycle at the time of the accident. The attention of the MACT was then brought to the fact that in proceedings in C.C.No.314/2009 before the Judicial Magistrate of the First Class, Wadakkancherry, which was a prosecution under Section 304A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 ( IPC ), the appellants have given evidence to the effect that they had not witnessed the accident and they had not seen Prakasan riding the motorcycle at the time of the accident. The deposition of the appellants before the Judicial Magistrate of the First Class, Wadakkancherry, was produced before the MACT, and thus the MACT came to the conclusion that false evidence had been tendered before the MACT by the appellants by stating that it was Prakasan who was riding the motorcycle, which was contrary to the statement made by the appellants before the Judicial Magistrate of the First Class, Wadakkancherry, in proceedings in C.C.NO.314/2009. It was also found that the appellants had denied the deposition given by them before the Judicial Magistrate of the First Class, Wadakkancherry. The MACT, therefore, came to the conclusion that the appellants had committed the offence punishable under Section 193 of the IPC and, therefore, forwarded the matter as a complaint to the Chief Judicial Magistrate Court, Thrissur, for prosecuting the appellants in terms of the provisions contained in Section 340 of the Cr.PC.

4. Smt. Dhanya P. Ashokan, the learned Senior Counsel appearing for the appellants on the instructions of Adv. M.R.Venugopal, submits that the order passed by the MACT is unsustainable in law. It is submitted that the MACT has not followed the procedure contemplated by the provisions of Section 340 of the Cr.P.C., and the MACT has failed to record the finding that it is expedient in the interest of justice that an enquiry should be made into any offence referred to in Clause (b) of sub-section (1) of Section 195 of the Cr.P.C. The learned Senior Counsel refers to the judgment of a Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court in Iqbal Singh Marwah v. Meenakshi Marwah ; 2005 KHC 647, to contend that in view of the language used in Section 340 of the Cr.PC, the court is not bound to make a complaint regarding the commission of an offence referred to in Section 195(1)(b) of the Cr.P.C, unless the court is of the opinion that it is expedient to do so in the interest of justice. The learned Senior Counsel has also placed reliance on the judgment of the Supreme Court in Pritish v. State of Maharashtra and Others ; 2002 KH