Successive complaints on the same cause of action amount to abuse of process, and criminal liability requires a clear statutory foundation which was absent in this case.

JUDGMENT :

Dr. Sanjeeb K Panigrahi, J.

1. The petitioners, Reliance Industries Ltd. (Petitioner No.1) and Shri Mukesh Dhirubhai Ambani (Petitioner No.2), have approached this Court seeking to quash I.C.C. Case No.27 of 2025 pending before the learned S.D.J.M., Panposh, Rourkela, together with the summoning order dated 27th January 2026 passed therein. The gravamen of the petition is that the impugned complaint represents the fourth round of criminal proceedings instituted by the very same complainant, on the very same factual foundation, arising from a telecom subscription transaction of the year 2003. The petitioners contend that the repeated institution of such proceedings constitutes a gross abuse of the process of this Court.

I. FACTUAL MATRIX OF THE CASE

2. The brief facts of the case are as follows:

(i) In the year 2003, the opposite party subscribed to a telecom scheme popularly known as “Kar Lo Duniya Mutthi Mein” operated under the Reliance brand, paying a sum of Rs. 501 and undertaking to make monthly payments thereafter. A mobile handset was supplied to him through a local dealer, M/s Balajee Agencies. According to the opposite party, the handset was defective from the outset and the promised telecom services were never properly available. This transaction forms the sole foundation upon which every subsequent proceeding has been erected.

(ii) Aggrieved by what he perceived as a wrong done to him, the opposite party filed his first criminal complaint, being I.C.C. No. 237 of 2003 before the learned S.D.J.M. (P), Uditnagar, Rourkela, alleging offences under Sections 294, 420, 423, 506, 323 and 34 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. That complaint was heard by this Court in CRLMC No. 963 of 2004, which quashed it on 03.01.2005, finding that the allegations, even taken at their highest, did not disclose any criminal offence against the petitioners.

(iii) The opposite party was not satisfied. He filed a second criminal complaint, being I.C.C. No. 226 of 2004, alleging offences under Sections 199, 406, 409, 418, 420, 427, 468, 477(A) read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, on substantially identical averments. That too was quashed by this Court in CRLMC No. 1924 of 2005 on 21.03.2006. And when the opposite party carried both quashing orders to the Hon’ble Supreme Court by way of Special Leave Petitions, being SLP (Crl.) No. 3216 of 2005 and SLP (Crl.) No. 1226 of 2007 respectively, those petitions were dismissed, thereby putting a seal of finality on the judicial conclusion that no criminal case lay against the present petitioners.

(iv) Undeterred by these successive reverses, the opposite party instituted a third complaint by way of a protest petition, which came to be registered as I.C.C. Case No. 257 of 2016. The learned Magistrate, upon conducting inquiry, took cognizance only against Shri Vinay Kumar Gupta, the proprietor of M/s Balajee Agencies, and specifically declined to summon Petitioner No.2 for want of incriminating material. The opposite party challenged this refusal by way of a criminal revision petition, being Crl. Rev. P. No. 904 of 2016, which this Court dismissed on 06.03.2017, recording the observation that the appropriate re