Judicial review in criminal cases does not equate to appellate review, maintaining respect for lower court findings unless perverse or unreasonable.

O R D E R

The challenge in this Crl. Revision Petition is to the judgment dated 22.10.2025 in Crl.Appeal No.66 of 2024 passed by the Additional District and Sessions Court, Pala, , confirming the conviction and sentence rendered by the Judicial First Class Magistrate Court, Erattupetta, in judgment dated 22.02.2024 in S.T. No.2497 of 2019.

2. The revision petitioner is the sole accused. He has been convicted under Section 138 of the Negotiable instruments Act, 1881 (for short ‘the NI Act’) and sentenced to pay a fine of Rs.50,000/- .

3. The complainant/respondent No.2 filed a complaint before the Trial Court alleging that the accused/revision petitioner executed Ext.P1 cheque for a sum of Rs.50,000/-. The complainant presented the cheque for encashment. It was dishonoured unpaid due to insufficiency of funds in the account of the accused. Even after the receipt of the statutory notice, the revision petitioner did not pay the amount covered by cheque.

4. The Trial Court took cognizance of the offence under Section 138 of the NI Act. The revision petitioner appeared on summons. He pleaded not guilty to the offence alleged.

5. The complainant gave evidence as PW1 in support of the averments in the complaint. He stated that the accused had borrowed a sum of Rs.50,000/- from the complainant and in discharge of the said liability, he executed Ext.P1 cheque in favour of the complainant. The plea of the accused during the trial was that the complainant had given his pick- up jeep to the accused on rent and in connection with that transaction, the complainant had obtained a blank cheque from him, which was later misused for filing the present complaint. The complainant has proved the execution of Ext.P1 cheque. Therefore, the statutory presumption under Section 139 has been drawn in favour of him. The accused failed to place any material to rebut the statutory presumption drawn in favour of the complainant.

6. I have carefully scanned the pleadings and evidence.

I failed to find any misreading of records by the Trial Court. The Sessions Court, after meticulously analyzing the findings confirmed the conviction rendered by the Trial Court.

7. Unless the order passed by the Magistrate is perverse or the view taken by the court is wholly unreasonable, or there is non-consideration of any relevant material, or there is palpable misreading of records, the Revisional Court is not justified in setting aside the order, merely because another view is possible. The Revisional Court is not meant to act as an appellate court. The whole purpose of the revisional jurisdiction is to preserve the power in the court to do justice in accordance with the principles of criminal jurisprudence. The revisional power of the court under Sections 397 to 401 Cr.P.C is not to be equated with that of an appeal. Unless the finding of the court, whose decision is sought to be revised, is shown to be perverse or untenable in law or is grossly erroneous or glaringly unreasonable or where the decision is based on no material or where the material facts are wholly ignored or where the judicial discretion is exercised arbitrarily or capriciously, the courts may not interfere with decision in exercise of their revisional jurisdiction. {Vide: Sanjaysinh Ramrao Chavan v. Dattatray Gulabrao Phalke [(2015) 3 SCC 123] , Munna Devi v. State of Rajasthan & Anr [(2001) 9 SCC 631)] and Asian Resurfacing of Road Agency Pvt. Ltd. v. Central Bureau of Investigation [(2018) 16 SCC 299)]}.

8. Therefore, this Court is of the view that the conviction and sentence require no interference. Hence, the Revision Petition is dismissed.

9. At this juncture, the learned counsel for the revision petitioner submitted that the r