The Court has inherent powers under Section 482 Cr.P.C. to transfer the investigation from one agency to another, including to the CBI, if the facts so warrant, but the same should be done in some rare and exceptional case, otherwise the CBI would be flooded with a large number of cases making it impossible to properly investigate all of them.

JUDGMENT

Jasjit Singh Bedi, J. (Oral). - The present petition has been filed under Section 482 Cr.P.C. for transfer of the investigation from the local police station and for getting it investigated from some other competent and honest officer and for filing the report under Section 173 Cr.P.C. against the private respondents in FIR No.171 dated 01.07.2021 under Sections 452, 324, 323, 148 and 149 IPC registered with Police Station Sadar Fazilka, District Fazilka.

1. The learned counsel for the petitioner contends that an FIR No.171 dated 01.07.2021 under Sections 452, 324, 323, 148 and 149 IPC came to be registered against the private respondent. The accused sought the concession of anticipatory bail which was declined on 09.09.2021 but till date the said accused are not being arrested. He, further submitted that in terms of the mandate of Section 173 Cr.P.C. every investigation under the Chapter ought to be completed without unnecessary delay and because of police protection, the investigation was not being conducted properly. He has, thus, contended that an independent agency be directed to investigate the above said case as there is a strong apprehension of a biased and unfair investigation. The reliance is placed upon a number of judgments of the Hon'ble Supreme Court as well as this Court to contend that the Court can transfer investigation where the accused is having an apprehension that the investigation is not being conducted in a fair manner.

2. I have heard the learned counsel for the petitioner.

3. There is no doubt that the Court has inherent powers under Section 482 Cr.P.C. to transfer the investigation from one agency to another, including to the CBI, if the facts so warrant, but the same should be done in some rare and exceptional case, otherwise the CBI would be flooded with a large number of cases making it impossible to properly investigate all of them.

4. The Hon'ble Supreme Court has dealt with the issues of the power to order the registration of an FIR, transfer investigations, to supervise the same and other allied issues in a number of judgments. Some of them are enumerated hereinbelow:-

In 'Sakiri Vasu versus State of U.P. and others, 2008 (1) RCR (Criminal) 392', the Hon'ble Supreme Court has held as under:-

'10. It has been held by this Court in CBI & another vs. Rajesh Gandhi and another 1997 Cr.L.J 63 (vide para 8) that no one can insist that an offence be investigated by a particular agency. We fully agree with the view in the aforesaid decision. An aggrieved person can only claim that the offence he alleges be investigated properly, but he has no right to claim that it be investigated by any particular agency of his choice.

11. In this connection we would like to state that if a person has a grievance that the police station is not registering his FIR under Section 154 Cr.P.C., then he can approach the Superintendent of Police under Section 154(3) Cr.P.C. by an application in writing.

Even if that does not yield any satisfactory result in the sense that either the FIR is still not registered, or that even after registering it no proper investigation is held, it is open to the aggrieved person to file an application under Section 156 (3) Cr.P.C. before the learned Magistrate concerned. If such an application under Section 156 (3) is filed before the Magistrate, the Magistrate can direct the FIR to be registered and also can direct a proper investigation to be made, in a case where, according to the aggrieved person, no proper investigation was made. The Magistrate can also under the same provision monitor the investigation to ensure a proper investigation.

12. Thus in Mohd. Yousuf vs. Smt. Afaq Jahan & Anr. JT 2006(1) SC 10, this Court observed:

The clear position therefore is that any judicial Magistrate, before taking cognizance of the offence, can order investigation under Section 156(3) of the Code. If he does so, he is not to examine the complainant on oath because he was not taking cognizance of any of