1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Crl. Revision No. 803 of 2009 Date of Decision: 6.10.2009 *** Sajjan Singh .. Petitioner Vs. State of Haryana & Ors. .. Respondents. CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE ARVIND KUMAR, Present:- Mr. A.K. Walia, Advocate for the petitioner. Mr. B.S. Sra, Addl. A.G. Punjab Mr. S.S. Sidhu, Advocate for respondents No.2 & 3. *** ARVIND KUMAR, J. The present petitioner is author of FIR No. 26 dated 6.3.2008, registered under Sections 307, 341, 506, 148, 149 IPC and 25,27,54,59 of Arms Act, P.S. Nathana. He is aggrieved with the order dated 9.1.2009 passed by the learned trial court by virtue of which the application of the prosecution under Section 319 Cr.P.C.(wrongly referred in the impugned order as Section 311 Cr.P.C. and Section 313 Cr.P.C.) for summoning and trial of Harmail Singh and Chhinder Pal Kaur (respondents No.2 and 3) along with other accused has been dismissed. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and have gone through the paper book carefully. In the considered opinion of the Court no ground to interfere with the impugned order is made out. Although the complainant in his initial version given to the police named respondents No.2 and 3 as members of the unlawful assembly, but his version, to their extent, was found not believable, as during an enquiry conducted by the DSP, both of them were found innocent and were placed in column No.2 in the challan. By merely mentioning the name of a person as an accused, criminal liability cannot be fastened upon the same. There has to be some 2 other material on record which may prompt the Court to believe that the person so accused has complicity in the offence and her/his conviction is likely to result in the eventuality of facing the trial, which is missing in this case. Admittedly, only one injury was found on the person of the complainant and from his own version given to the police as well as while deposing in the Court, the complicity of respondents No.2 and 3 in the alleged offence has been shown only to the extent of grappling with complainant that too after inflicting of the said injury by Sukhmander, the husband of respondent No.3, who is already arraigned as accused and facing trial. The impugned order reveals that the strained relations between the parties was also one of the factor taken into consideration by the learned trial Court in not summoning respondents No.2 and 3. The provisions of Section 319 of the Code confers an extra ordinary power and should not be easily resorted to. It is well settled that sweep of Section 319 Cr.P.C. is limited as it is an enabling provision which can be invoked only if there is convincing evidence disclosing the complicity of the person other than the person (s) already arraigned as accused. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Michael Machado v. Central Bureau of Investigation, 2000(2) RCR (Criminal) 75 (SC) has observed as under:- “11. The basic requirements for invoking the above section is that it should appear to the Court from the evidence collected during trial or in the inquiry that some other person, who is not arraigned as an accused in that case, had committed an offence for which that person could be tried together with the accused already arraigned. It is not enough that the Court entertained some doubt, from the evidence, about the involvement of another person in the offence. In other words, the Court must have reasonable satisfaction from the evidence already collected regarding two aspects. First is that the other person has committed an offence. Second is that for such offence that other person could as well be tried along with the already arraigned accused. 3 12. But even then, what is conferred on the Court is only a discretion as could be discerned from the words "the Court may proceed against such person". The discretionary power so conferred should be exercised only to achieve criminal justice. It is not that the Court should turn against another person whenever it comes across evidence connecting that another person also with the offence. A judicial exercise is called for keeping a conspectus of the case, including the stage at which the trial has proceeded already and the quantum of evidence collected till then, and also the amount of time which the Court had spent for collecting such evidence. It must be remembered that there is no compelling duty on the Court to proceed against other persons.” When the facts of the case are considered in the light of legal position, enumerated above, no fault could be found with the approach of the learned trial court while dismissing the application of the complainant under Section 319 Cr.P.C. The revision petition being without any merit is dismissed. (ARVIND KUMAR) JUDGE October 6,2009 Jiten