A director board member of a co-operative society has the right to enter the chamber of the secretary, and such entry does not amount to criminal trespass.

ORDER

Dated this the 3rd day of January, 2023 This Crl.M.C. has been preferred to quash all further proceedings in C.C No.1288/2019 on the files of Judicial First Class Magistrate Court, Wadakkancherry.

2. The petitioner is the sole accused. The 3rd respondent is the defacto complainant. The offences alleged against the petitioner are punishable under Sections 341, 323, 353, 354 and 506 (1) of the Indian Penal Code.

3. The petitioner is the Director Board Member and the 3rd respondent is the Secretary of the Wadakkancherry Block Multipurpose Co-operative Society. The meeting of Board of Directors of the Co-operative society was convened on 07.09.2019 at 11.A.M. Since there was no sufficient quorum, the meeting did not take place. The prosecution allegation is that, on that date, at 11 A.M, the petitioner trespassed into the chamber of the 3rd respondent, wanted certain documents relating to his loan for his perusal and when she refused to furnish those documents, he pushed her, criminally intimidated her, took the files and photographed some of the documents using his mobile phone. It is alleged that the above acts were done by the petitioner with intent to deter the 3rd respondent from discharging her duty as a public servant and also to outrage her modesty

4. Heard Sri. C.D Dileep, the learned counsel appearing for the petitioner, Sri. M.Ravikrishnan, the learned counsel for the 3rd respondent and Sri.Sangeetha Raj, the learned Public Prosecutor for the State.

5. The learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that even if the entire allegations in the FIS together with the materials collected during the investigation are believed in its entirety, no offence punishable under Sections 341, 323, 353, 354 and 506(1) of the IPC are made out. On the other hand, the learned counsel for the 3rd respondent submitted that the FIS as well as the materials collected during the investigation disclose the ingredients of the offences under Sections 341, 323, 353, 354 and 506(1) IPC and when a prima facie case is made out, the jurisdiction vested with this Court under Section

482 of Cr.P.C cannot be invoked.

6. I went through the FIS and the entire final report. The petitioner is the member of the Director Board of the society namely Wadakkancherry Block Multipurpose Co-operative Society. The 3rd respondent is its Secretary. Admittedly, the petitioner stood as a surety for a loan availed from the society. The alleged incident was taken place inside the chamber of the 3rd respondent, who is the Secretary. According to the 3rd respondent, the petitioner entered into the room and wanted to peruse documents relating to the above mentioned loan. However, the 3rd respondent did not grant permission to peruse the documents and thereafter the alleged incident was taken place. As stated already, the petitioner is a Director Board member of the society. Being a board member of the society, he has every right to enter into the chamber of the

3rd respondent who is the Secretary. Hence, the petitioner's entry into the chamber of 3rd respondent cannot be termed as a criminal trespass so as to attract the offence under Section 341 of IPC. However, the FIS given by the 3rd respondent would clearly show that she was manhandled and assaulted by the petitioner at her chamber and he took the files related to his own accounts forcefully and photographed some of the documents using his mobile phone. The averments would show that the official duty of the 3rd respondent was obstructed. Hence, there are ingredients to attract the offences under Sections 323 and 324 of IPC. The 3rd respondent has also stated that the petitioner has criminally intimidated her and Section 506(1) of IPC also is attracted. However, there is nothing on record to suggest that these acts were done by the petitioner with an intention to outrage the modesty of the 3rd respondent, and hence Section 354 IPC is not attracted.

7. In the light of the above findings, the offence under Sections 341 and