THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE N.RAVI SHANKAR CRL.P.No.4845 OF 2009 ORDER:- The petitioner herein, which is a limited Company, ﬁled a private complaint before the Court of XIV Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Hyderabad alleging offences punishable under Sections 406, 420 and 506 read with 34 I.P.C. against the two accused i.e., A-1 and A-2 arrayed therein. 2. The version of the complainant is that A-1 and A-2 purchased some chemicals from it and later on, fell due a sum of Rs.9,02,223/- and in part discharge of the same, they issued certain cheques, which were ultimately dishonoured. The allegation made in the complaint is that right from the beginning, both A-1 and A-2 had an intention to cheat the complainant and on this premise, it laid private complaint. 3. The learned Magistrate considered the complaint and on 02.05.2009, passed the following order: “Perused the contents of complaint. It shows that there are no allegations in the complaint that accused had dishonest intention not to pay even at the time of issuance of the cheques and resulted in causing damage to his body, mind and reputation to attract oﬀences under Sections 406, 420 and 506 I.P.C. Hence, complainant is directed to take action under Section 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act. Accordingly, complaint is returned.” The present petition is ﬁled to quash the above order directing return of complaint. 4. Heard Sri V.L.V.Kesava Rao, learned Counsel for petitioner and the learned Additional Public Prosecutor. Learned Counsel for respondent No.2 is absent and as the matter is of the year 2009, it is being disposed of. 5. The learned Counsel for the petitioner/complainant says that despite the allegations made in the complaint, which show the oﬀences alleged in it, the learned Magistrate returned the complaint by passing the above order directing the complainant to ﬁle complaint for the oﬀence under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act and this order is illegal. 6. A perusal of the order passed by the learned Magistrate, which has been extracted above, would show that he in fact exercised what is called an advisory jurisdiction, which he is not supposed to do. 7. It is settled now that even after enactment of Section 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act, there is no bar for an aggrieved person to prosecute the drawer for an oﬀence of cheating. It may be noted that if the Magistrate ﬁnds that the complaint ﬁled by the petitioner does not disclose any oﬀence or any ground to proceed against the accused, it was always open for him to dismiss it in exercise of his power under Section 203 Cr.P.C. It was also open for him to refer the matter to police under Section 156(3) Cr.P.C. or even proceed under Section 202 Cr.P.C. if that was warranted. He should have adopted one of the above courses, but in the present case, he passed the above order advising the complainant to prosecute the accused for the oﬀences mentioned by him. 8. It may be noted that it is always the privilege of the complainant to pursue whatever remedy he is advised to pursue. In the above circumstances, I am of the opinion that the impugned order of the learned Magistrate cannot be allowed to stand and it is accordingly, set aside. The complainant shall now present the complaint before the learned Magistrate and the learned Magistrate shall dispose of the same in accordance with law without exercising any advisory jurisdiction. 8. Thus, the Criminal Petition is, accordingly, allowed. _____________________ N.RAVI SHANKAR, J 03rd December, 2011. AMD THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE N.RAVI SHANKAR CRL.P.No.4845 OF 2009 Date:03.12.2011 AMD