Mere purchase of land from a person, who was not the owner of the same, does not constitute an offence under Section 420 IPC.

1. - The present petition has been filed under Section 482 Cr.P.C. praying that case arising out of F.I.R. No. 5/2013 dated 7.1.2013 registered at Police Station Kelwara, district Rajsamand for offences under Section 420 I.P.C., be quashed.

2. Pema - respondent No. 2, on 7.1.2013 submitted an application for registration of a case against (1) Smt. Dayli W/o Gajing Kharwad, (2) Hemsingh S/o Gajing Kharwad, (3) Tulsa Singh S/o Gajing Kharwad, (4) Smt. Mira D/o Gajing Kharwad and W/o Ganesh Singh Rajput, (5) Smt. Bhanwari D/o Gajing Kharwad and W/o Kishan Singh Rajput, (6) Smt. Laxmi D/o Gajing Kharwad and W/o Bheru Singh all residents of Uthdon ki Bhagal, Kadiya, Police Station Kelwara, (7) Bhanwar Singh S/o Gulab Singh Rajput, and (8) Roop Singh S/o Gulab Singh Rajput.

3. Complainant stated in the application that he was owner of 2 bighas 19 biswas of land as per the revenue record and furthermore in the record of Canal of village Gamdi, Kesa was recorded as owner of 56 Aaraji. On 6.6.1962, Dola and Lakhma had purchased said land from Kesa by way of registered sale deed. From the date, the sale deed was executed, Dola - father of the complainant was in possession of the land. According to complainant, Kesa had died about 14 years ago living behind his son Gajing.

4. A grievance has been made by the complainant that legal heirs of Gajing on 2.11.2012 got their names recorded in the revenue record and on 9.11.2012 sold the land to the petitioners. Complainant had made a grievance that petitioners being accused Nos. 7 and 8, knew that grand-father of accused Nos. 1 to 6 had already sold land to the father of the complainant. Petitioners purchased land from accused Nos. 1 to 6 and therefore, had cheated the complainant.

5. It would be apposite her to reproduce opinion of the Investigating Officer, which after translation read as under:

"From the entire investigation and statement of the witnesses and perusal of the revenue record and sale deed, it has come to the notice that above said accused fully aware that there is no land in their name had wrongly executed sale deed thereby offence under Section 420 I.P.C. is fully proved against the accused."

6. Shri B.L. Choudhary, appearing for the petitioners has relied upon Md. Ibrahim & Ors. v. State of Bihar & Anr., 2009 Cr.L.R. (SC) 746 , to contend that since prosecution has decided to prosecute the petitioners for offence under Section 420 I.P.C. only, it is apparent that no offence under Sections 467, 471 I.P.C. has been made out during investigation. Counsel contend that merely because petitioners have purchased a land from the persons, who were not competent to sell, it cannot be said that petitioners have committed offence under Section 420 I.P.C.

7. It would be apposite here to reproduce relevant paras of Md. Ibrahim's case (supra):

"12. The sale deeds executed by first appellant, clearly and obviously do not fall under the second and third categories of 'false documents'. It therefore remains to be seen whether the claim of the complainant that the execution of sale deeds by the first accused, who was in no way connected with the land, amounted to committing forgery of the documents with the intention of taking possession of complainant's land (and that accused 2 to 5 as the purchaser, witness, scribe and stamp vendor colluded with first accused in execution and registration of the said sale deeds) would bring the case under the first category. There is a fundamental difference between a person executing a sale deed claiming that the property conveyed is his property, and a person executing a sale deed by impersonating the owner or falsely claiming to be authorised or empowered by the owner, to execute the deed on owner's behalf. When a person executes a document conveying a property describing it as his, there are two possibilities. The first is that he bona fide believes that the property actually belongs to him. The second is that he may be dishonestly or fraudulently claim