JUDGMENT :

SANJAY DHAR, J.

1. The petitioners, through the medium of the present petition, have invoked inherent jurisdiction of this Court under Section 561-A of the Jammu and Kashmir Code of Criminal Procedure (now Section 528 of BNSS) seeking quashment of order dated 29.05.2018 passed by learned Sessions Judge, Kishtwar (“Revisional Court”) whereby order dated 13.06.2017 passed by learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Kishtwar (“Trial Magistrate”) has been set aside and the learned trial Magistrate has been directed to proceed against the petitioners/accused in accordance with law.

2. Briefly stated the facts leading to the filing of the present petition are that on 23.04.2012, petitioner No. 1-Mohd Yaseen, who was Investigating Officer in case FIR No. 03 of 2012 for offences under sections 376/363/109 RPC registered with Police Station, Kishtwar, brought seven accused including accused Shah Nawaz and Hussain Dar in proper custody before the court of learned trial Magistrate for the purpose of presentation of challan in the aforesaid case. When he opened the handcuffs of the accused, above named two accused fled away from the custody of the police and a report in this regard was received by the Police Station, Kishtwar on 24.04.2012. On the basis of the said report, FIR No. 93/2012 for offences under Sections 223/224 came to be registered by the police.

3. It also appears that learned trial Magistrate while entertaining the challan in case FIR No. 03 of 2012 of Police Station, Kishtwar, after noticing the fact that accused Hussain Dar and Shah Nawaj had escaped from the custody of the police during their production before the Court, directed SHO, Police Station, Kishtwar to lodge an FIR against the accused, who had escaped from the custody as also against the police officials responsible for their escape. This was done in terms of order dated 24.04.2012 passed by the learned trial Magistrate.

4. After registration of the FIR, the investigation of the case was conducted. During investigation of the case, it came to the fore that the accused, who had escaped, were in fact not brought to the Court. It was found that the concerned police officials instead of confining the two escaped accused in the lockup of the police station, had kept them in the premises of the police station. While petitioner No. 1- ASI Mohammad Yaseen and Munshi of the police station, namely, petitioner No. 2-Waris Hussain Shah were busy in their official business, the two accused, namely, Shah Nawaz and Hussain Dar fled away from the premises of the police station. Thus, offence under Section 223 RPC was found established against the petitioners, who happen to be police officials and offence under section 224 RPC was found established against the accused Hussain Dar and Shah Nawaj. Accordingly, the challan was laid before the learned trial Magistrate.

5. Since the challan was presented before the court after the expiry of prescribed period of limitation, the learned trial Magistrate vide its order dated 06.04.2016, after recording the satisfaction that it is necessary to condone the delay in the interests of justice, took cognizance of the offences and proceeded to issue process against the petitioners and the co-accused. When the petitioners appeared before the learned trial Magistrate, they sought their discharge on the grounds that provisions of Rule 349 of J&K Police Rules have not been adhered to in the present case and that previous sanction of the competent authority in terms of Section 197 CrPC has not been obtained before presentation of the challan against them. The learned trial Magistrate, vide his order dated 13.06.2017, accepted the contention of the petitioners and discharged them while proceeding against the other two accused, namely, Shah Nawaj and Hussain Dar.

6. The aforesaid order was challenged by the respondent- State by way of a revision petition before the Revisional Court. Vide impugned order dated 29.05.2018, the learned Revisional Court a