TMI Blog2009 (7) TMI 1143X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... endered by a learned Single Judge of the High Court of Punjab Haryana at Chandigarh in Criminal Miscellaneous No. 47932-M of 2004. By the impugned judgment, the learned Judge, while partly allowing the petition preferred under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for short the Code ) seeking quashing of a private complaint filed by the respondent (hereinafter referred to as the complainant ) under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 (for short the Act ) has dismissed the petition qua the appellant. 3. In order to appreciate the controversy, a few material facts may be stated thus: The complainant is engaged in the trading of petroleum products. According to him, the appellant, his father, brother and mother used to purchase mobile oil from him from time to time. According to the complainant, on 20th November, 2000, all four of them got issued a cheque bearing No. 227739 drawn on Indian Bank, Sonepat in the sum of Rs.24,92,115/- in discharge of their liability towards him. The complainant presented the cheque for payment to his bankers, which was returned unpaid on 29 th December, 2000 with the remarks Account closed . Thereafter, on 17th J ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... hing of the complaint. As noted earlier, by a short order, the High Court has dismissed the petition qua accused No.1, the appellant herein, on the ground that the plea of the appellant that the cheque was not issued by him involved a disputed question of fact which could not be gone into by the Court in proceedings under Section 482 of the Code. As regards the rest of three accused petitioners, the learned Judge allowed the petition holding that neither the cheque had been issued by them nor they had been shown to be vicariously liable under Section 141 of the Act. Aggrieved by the said decision, the appellant has come up in appeal before us. 6. Learned counsel appearing for the appellant submitted that the High Court gravely erred in declining to exercise its jurisdiction under Section 482 of the Code in a case where the complaint ex facie lacked the basic ingredients of the offence under Section 138 of the Act for which the appellant has been made to stand trial. It was contended that admittedly, the cheque in question, purportedly issued by the appellant, was from an account not maintained by him with the Indian Bank but by one Ms. Shilpa Chaudhary and therefore, the basic in ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... within a period of six months from the date on which it is drawn or within the period of its validity, whichever is earlier; (b) the payee or the holder in due course of the cheque, as the case may be, makes a demand for the payment of the said amount of money by giving a notice in writing, to the drawer of the cheque, within thirty days of the receipt of information by him from the bank regarding the return of the cheque as unpaid; and (c) the drawer of such cheque fails to make the payment of the said amount of money to the payee or, as the case may be, to the holder in due course of the cheque, within fifteen days of the receipt of the said notice. Explanation. For the purposes of this section, "debt or other liability" means a legally enforceable debt or other liability. 9. It is manifest that to constitute an offence under Section 138 of the Act, the following ingredients are required to be fulfilled: (i) a person must have drawn a cheque on an account maintained by him in a bank for payment of a certain amount of money to another person from out of that account; (ii) The cheque should have been issued for the discharge, in whole or in part, of any debt or other li ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... xercised its jurisdiction under Section 482 of the Code? 13. The scope and ambit of powers of the High Court under Section 482 of the Code has been enunciated and reiterated by this Court in a series of decisions and several circumstances under which the High Court can exercise jurisdiction in quashing proceedings have been enumerated. Therefore, it is unnecessary to burden the judgment by making reference to all the decisions on the point. It would suffice to state that though the powers possessed by the High Courts under the said provision are very wide but these should be exercised in appropriate cases, ex debito justitiae to do real and substantial justice for the administration of which alone the courts exist. The inherent powers do not confer an arbitrary jurisdiction on the High Court to act according to whim or caprice. The powers have to be exercised sparingly, with circumspection and in the rarest of rare cases, where the court is convinced, on the basis of material on record, that allowing the proceedings to continue would be an abuse of the process of the court or that the ends of justice require that the proceedings ought to be quashed. [See: Janata Dal Vs. H.S. Chow ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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