HONOURABLE SRI JUSTICE RAJA ELANGO CRIMINAL PETITION No.6490 OF 2010 Dated : 13.07.2010. Between : M.Varaprasad … Petitioner A n d The State of A.P. & others … Respondents HONOURABLE SRI JUSTICE RAJA ELANGO CRIMINAL PETITION No.6490 OF 2010 ORDER: This criminal petition under section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure is filed by the petitioner-accused seeking to quash the proceedings in P.R.C.No.16 of 2010 on the file of the III Additional Judicial First Class Magistrate, Rajahmundry, East Godavari District, for the offence punishable under section 3 (1) (x) of SCs & STs (POA) Act and section 506 of Indian Penal Code. Heard the learned counsel for the petitioner and the learned Additional Public Prosecutor. Case of the de facto complainant is that while he was working as Warder at Central Prison, Rajahmundry, the petitioner-accused was his superior working as Deputy Superintendent of Central Prison, Rajahmundry. It is alleged that the petitioner belong to Kapu community and the complainant belong to Mala (SC) community, due to which, the petitioner-accused used to ill-treat him and due to unbearable ill-treatment of the petitioner, complainant made several representations to their higher officials complaining about the petitioner, for which, petitioner-accused bore grudge against him and keeping same in mind on 21.06.2009 while the complainant was going to Bommuru on his motor bike, petitioner-accused obstructed him, dashed his vehicle and abused him touching his caste name. Complaining the same, complainant lodged a report before the Police, basing on which, a case in crime No.192 of 2009 is registered by the Police for the offence punishable under section 3 (1) (x) of SCs & STs Act, but no action was taken against the petitioner-accused. Aggrieved by the same, the complainant lodged the present private complaint before the III Additional Judicial I Class Magistrate, Rajahmundry, which is numbered as PRC No.16 of 2010. Present petitioner is a Deputy Superintendent of Central Prison and the complainant is one of his subordinates. It is seen from the record that after recording the sworn statements of the witnesses, the learned Magistrate on 02.07.2010 taken cognizance of the case and issued a non-bailable warrant against the present petitioner to secure his presence. This is a case where the Police investigated into the complaint lodged by the complainant and referred the same as ‘mistake of fact’. Subsequently, on a private complaint filed by the complainant, the learned Magistrate taken cognizance and issued a non-bailable warrant. As prima facie material on record i.e. sworn statements of the witnesses recorded by the learned Magistrate while taking cognizance of the private complaint discloses material against the petitioner- accused, this Court is of the considered view that it is premature to consider the case of the petitioner for quashing the proceedings. Learned counsel for the petitioner also challenges the issuance of non-bailable warrant by the learned Magistrate and this Court also able to see some force in such contention. When cognizance of an offence is taken, of course, the Magistrate is empowered to issue a non-bailable warrant, but it should be based and substantiated by the facts and circumstances of the case and the main purpose of issuing a non-bailable warrant would be to secure the presence of the accused before the Court, but such issuance of non-bailable warrant should not be as a matter of course. In the present case, the petitioner is a government servant, as such, the question of petitioner absconding or any difficulty in securing his presence does not arise. Therefore, this Court is of the view that non- bailable warrant issued against the petitioner can be recalled. Therefore, this Criminal petition is disposed of with a direction to the petitioner to appear before the Court below and file a fresh application seeking to recall the non-bailable warrant. However, in view of the plea taken by the petitioner in the criminal petition that earlier petitioner appeared before the Court along with his counsel and filed a petition to recall the non-bailable warrant issued against him and the same was rejected by the learned Magistrate, it is directed that the learned Magistrate shall recall the non-bailable warrant issued against the petitioner. ________________________ JUSTICE RAJA ELANGO Dated : 13.07.2010. sur