The judgment established the need to scrutinize the circumstances and materials beyond the complaint in cases of malicious or frivolous proceedings, and emphasized that civil disputes should not be converted into criminal cases.

JUDGMENT :

Heard Mr. Pandey Neeraj Rai, learned counsel for the petitioners, Ms. Amrita Kumari and Ms. Nehala Sharmin, learned counsel for the State and Mr. Mahavir Prasad Sinha, learned counsel for opposite party no.2.

2. In both the petitions, common complaint case as well as orders are under challenge and in view of that, both the petitions are heard together with consent of the parties.

3. In both the petitions, the prayer is made for quashing the entire criminal proceeding in Complaint Case P.C.R. Case No.881/2016 including the order taking cognizance dated 05.06.2017, pending in the Court of the learned Judicial Magistrate, 1st Class, Deoghar.

4. On 10.07.2017, these matters were taken up and notices were issued upon opposite party no.2 and on that day, the entire criminal proceeding was stayed and from time to time, the said order was extended. In the meantime, opposite party no.2 filed Criminal Revision No.73 of 2017, which was allowed vide order dated 26.05.2022 and remanded the matter to the learned Court to pass a fresh order and pursuant to that, further summoning order dated 08.08.2022 has been passed. In view of these developments, I.A. No.9979 of 2022 was filed for amendment in the prayer portion, which was allowed vide order dated 02.11.2022 and in view of that, the revisional order dated 26.05.2022 and summoning order dated 08.08.2022 are also under challenge in these petitions.

5. The complaint case was filed alleging therein that the complainant-Sangita Devi decided to establish her own business with the help of her husband-Sri Manoj Kumar. She claimed to have contacted with the officials of Piaggio Vehicles Private Limited alongwith her husband. Thereafter dealership of Deoghar was granted by the company to the partnership firm-M/s Durga Motors, Deoghar in which the complainant and her husband are partners.

It was further alleged that the company never arrived at any written agreement with the complainant or her husband or the partnership firm despite repeated requests.

It was also alleged that pursuant to grant of dealership, the business of the company shot up due to efforts of the complainant and her husband. It was further alleged that seeing the prosperity of the business, the accused nos. 1 and 2 have demanded money, which was refused by the complainant and her husband. Then all the accused persons became hostile to the complainant and her firm and without taking her consent, another dealership for Deoghar was given to one Shri Krishna Motors, Deoghar with a view to cause wrongful loss to the complainant and her firm. It was also alleged that the complainant gave Rs.2 Lakh to the accused no.1, which according to her would be shared amongst others.

It was further alleged that the complainant received complaints from customers of the other dealer-Shri Krishna Motors and found that the proprietor of Shri Krishna Motors (accused no.8-Niraj Kumar Gupta) was adopting unfair and illegal trade practice in connivance with other accused and selling the vehicles at the rate higher than the actual rate. Thus, according to the complainant wrongful loss had been caused.

It was also alleged that the other accused nos. 1 to 7 did not take action against the accused no.8 and upon complaint been made against him.

It was further alleged that even the documents and materials collected by the complainant against the accused no.8 upon being supplied to other accused persons for taking stern action were not acted upon. Rather accused no.1 became infuriated and abused and misbehaved with her. Threats were extended of falsely implicating the complainant and her husband in a case of severe nature. The dealership of the complainant was terminated by letter dated 17.11.2015 with the return of credit balance alongwith the security deposit. The company in turn demanded C-Form of the sales tax but no pain was taken to return the old stock including the spare parts and vehicles. The company also did not clear claims and incentives.