Point of Law:
Magistrate had issued summons without meeting the mandatory requirement of Section 202, Cr.P.C. thought the appellants were outside his territorial jurisdiction. The provisions of Section 202, Cr.P.C. were amended vide the Amendment Act, 2005, making it mandatory to postpone the issue of process where the accused resides in a area beyond the territorial jurisdiction of the Magistrate concerned. The same was found necessary in order to protect innocent persons from being harassed by unscrupulous persons and making it obligatory upon the Magistrate to enquire into the case himself, or to direct investigation to be made by a police officer, or by such other persons as he thinks fit for the purpose of finding out whether or not, there was sufficient ground for proceeding against the accused before issuing summons in such cases.

JUDGMENT :

RAHUL CHATURVEDI, J.

1. Heard Sri. Amit Daga, Advocate assisted by Sri. Anshul Kumar Singhal, learned counsel for the applicants, at length, learned AGA for the State and perused the record.

2. On the preliminary submissions raised by learned counsel for the applicants based on solitary legal issue as to whether the summoning order dated 24.10.2019 is in consonance with the mandate of law required u/s 202(1) Cr.P.C. or not? This Court, with the assistance of learned A.G.A. finds it fit to adjudicate the present 482 application at the threshold/admission stage itself.

3. By means of the present application the applicants have conjured for invoking extra-ordinary jurisdiction of this Court under Section 482 Cr.P.C. against order dated 31.05.2019 passed by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Saharanpur whereby the lower Revisional Court, while allowing Criminal Revision No. 231 of 2018, Pradeep Yadav vs. Manish Kumar Yadav and Others has set aside the order dated 09.08.2018 passed by the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Saharanpur in Criminal Complaint No. 4578 of 2018. It has further remanded the case to the court concerned with the direction to pass a fresh order after holding requisite enquiry, as per the requirement enunciated under the provisions of Section 202(1) Cr.P.C. Taking into account the aforesaid direction, the learned Magisterial court, proceeded with the case afresh, recorded statements of the required witnesses and summoned the applicants under Sections 323, 324, 307 and 506 I.P.C. vide order dated 24.10.2019.

4. Basic punch of the argument advanced by learned counsel for the applicants is that while passing the subsequent summoning order dated 24.10.2019, learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Saharanpur has not adhered to the mandatory requirements of law as contemplated under Section 202(1) Cr.P.C. i.e. neither he has enquired into the case for himself nor directed the police to investigate into the matter so as to record his prima-facie satisfaction and sufficiency of grounds for the summoning of the accused persons. This solitary legal submission beseeched by the learned counsel for the applicants has to be x-rayed by this court.

5. After hearing the rival submissions, keenly perusing the orders under challenge and the relevant documents filed in support of instant 482 application, submitted by counsel for the applicants, it is imperative to pandect facts of the case:-

“1. Applicant no. 1 is the son of applicant no. 2, got married with the daughter of opposite party no. 2, thus basically and primarily it is a matrimonial dispute.

2. The daughter of opposite party no. 2, Ms. Niharika got married with applicant no. 1 on 03.03.2014. Admittedly contesting parties are permanent resident of New Delhi and the said marriage too was solemnized in New Delhi. Due to misfortune, the conjugal relationship got sour and strained and there arose rift between husband and wife, resultantly, as a natural corollary, there were number of civil as well as criminal litigations against each other, including proceedings of The Hindu Marriage Act, The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act 2005, Maintenance under Section 125 Cr.P.C. so on and so forth, details of which has been annexed as Annexure No. 7 to the petition. Needless to mention here that all these proceedings are pending in different forums at New Delhi.

3. An unfortunate incident took place on 25.12.2016 at Saharanpur of which an application u/s 156(3) Cr.P.C. was filed before Chief Judicial Magistrate, Saharanpur by opposite party no. 2 on 03.01.2017 with the prayer to direct the police to register FIR under Section 307, 308,323,324,504,506 I.P.C., consequently Case Crime No. 141 of 2017 was registered at Police Station Sadar Bazar, Saharanpur on 23.3.2017 under the aforementioned sections of I.P.C. However, the police after investigation submitted its closure report on 24.8.2017. The said closure report was protested by opposite party no. 2 on 11.01.2018 and learned