The central legal point established in the judgment is that the continuation of a criminal proceeding would amount to an abuse of process of the Court if no offence could be made out against the accused.

JUDGMENT :

1. Heard the parties.

2. Criminal Miscellaneous Petition No. 1358 of 2018 has been filed invoking the jurisdiction of this Court under Section 482 Cr.P.C. with a prayer to quash the entire criminal proceeding arising out of Complaint Case No. 232 of 2018 (Forest) including the order taking cognizance dated 08.03.2018 under Section 33 of the Indian Forest Act, 1927, passed by the learned Judicial Magistrate -1st Class, Bokaro and Criminal Miscellaneous Petition No. 1064 of 2020 has been filed invoking the jurisdiction of this Court under Section 482 Cr.P.C. with a prayer to quash the entire criminal proceeding arising out of Complaint Case No. 1233 of 2018 (Forest) including the order taking cognizance dated 23.06.2019 under Section 33 of the Indian Forest Act, 1927, passed by the learned Judicial Magistrate -1st Class, Bokaro

3. The allegation against the petitioners in Complaint Case No. 232 of 2018 (Forest) in respect of which Criminal Miscellaneous Petition No. 1358 of 2018 has been filed is that the petitioners were constructing house after encroaching over plot no. 15 of Mouza – Bandhagoda, Thana No. 35 which is a protected forest land. The forest officials reached the place of occurrence and upon seeing the forest officials, the persons who were involved in constructing the house fled away. The forest officials could apprehend the petitioners who were involved in encroaching the forest land and for their own profit constructing houses and they could not produce any documents in support of the place of occurrence land.

4. The allegation against the petitioner in Complaint Case No. 1233 of 2018 (Forest) in respect of which Criminal Miscellaneous Petition No. 1064 of 2020 has been filed, is that on 06.11.2018 when the complainant–forest guard along with other forest officials were on patrolling within the forest land, they saw that 4-5 labourers were illegally carrying on construction work in the upper storey of the building and were carrying out construction of the wall by using bricks and cement inside the house and when the complainant–forest guard along with the other forest official attempted to make the door of the ground floor open with a view to stop the construction work, the persons who were carrying out the construction work on the upper storey of the building did not open the door.

5. It is submitted by Mr. Rama Kant Tiwari, the learned counsel for the petitioners that no offence under Section 33 of the Indian Forest Act, 1927 is made out against the petitioners as plot no. 15 is a raiyati land which has been purchased by the petitioners by registered sale deed from Adarsh Co-operative House Construction Society Ltd. of the then district –Dhanbad now the district of Bokaro. It is then submitted by the learned counsel for the petitioners that plot no.15 involved in this case was the subject matter before this Court in Criminal Miscellaneous Petition No. 2730 of 2017 which was allowed vide order dated 04.08.2022 and the entire criminal proceeding of the connected complaint case including the order taking cognizance was quashed by this Court. It is next submitted by Mr. Tiwari that the said plot number 15 was also the subject matter of Cr.M.P. Nos. 3031 & 3428 both of 2019, 594 of 2020, 628 of 2020 and 631 of 2020 and vide order dated 18.10.2022, a Co-ordinate Bench of this Court has quashed the entire criminal proceeding of connected complaint cases and respective orders taking cognizance, pending before the learned Judicial Magistrate -1st Class, Bokaro, was quashed. Para -4 of the order dated 04.08.2022 of Cr. M.P. No. 2730 of 2017 reads as under:-

“4. Mr. Saurav Arun, learned counsel for the petitioners submits that the petitioner no. 1 is the President and petitioner no. 3 is the Secretary of Adarsh Sahkari Grih Nirwan Samiti. He further submits that the land in dispute is plot nos. 5 and 15 of village Bandhgora, Thana No. 35, P.S. Pindrajora, District-Bokaro which was raiyati land and earlier a dispute w