11 201 $WG§E 3ENH IN TE IH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILAsPU w W$ . P. t Cr. i No. o / R d ajesh Gupta, S/o Kamta Prasa Gupta, aged a‘bou ‘30 years ccupation-x Business,« rR/o Raj Poultty Farm, Near Gudri Bazar mbikapur, Distt. Sarguja (C. PETITIONER VS ERSU /. , State of ChhattiSgarh, Throug Police Dt Station Ampuar isrict Sarguja (C.G.) RIT PTITION UNDER ARTICLE 226 OF TH CONSTITUTION OF ND G) € H HG R f , O , A G.) h bik, RESPONDENT W E E IIA HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR ’ S.B: M Hon’ble Shri Prashant Kumar Mishra Writ Petition {C13} No. 463/201 1 PETITIONER : Rajesh Gupta Versus WRIT PETITION UNDER ARTICLE 226 OF THE M CONsTITUTIoN OF INDIA ORAL ORDER (27.01 .201 1) Heard. (2) The petitioner has called in question the order passed by the 4m Additional Sessions Judge (F.T.C.), Ambikapur, District Sarguja allowing the revision preferred by one Paras Sahu which in turn was preferred against the order passed by the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Ambikapur on 12/04/2010 rejecting his application under section 173 (8) orcr.P.c.. (3) An FIR was lodged on Crime No. 479/2009 in the Police Station, Ambikapur, District Sarguja for offence under section 4203 l20-B, 34 of IPC by Ram Pyari on the allegation that land belonging t to her husband Chamru Sahu has been entered in the revenue records in the name of Sanjay Ambast, Shiv Narayan Gupta, Bihari Singh, Vijay Kumar, Surendra Agrawal, Tahsildar, his reader etc after Xetting it recorded firstly in the name of Anil Kumar on the basis of RESPONDENT : State of Aggearance: Shri S.R. Sinha, counsel for the petitioner. Shti §G.D. Vaswani, Government Advocate for ,2? forged will. It was stated in the FIR that the land is valued at Rs.4.5 crores. Name of her lawyer Abdul Rasid Siddiqui and his junior Mr. Ambast along with the present petitioner has also been mentioned as suspect in column 7 of the FIR (Annexure P-l). In the concluding part of the written complaint, which has been reproduced in the FIR, name of the present petitioner has again been mentioned as one of the culprit. It appears the Investigating Omcer did not file any charge sheet against the present petitioner and some other suspects, therefore an application under section 173 (8) of Cr.P.C. was moved before the Chief Judicial Magistrate vide Annexure P-3 for directing the Investigating Omcer to reinvestigate and submit additional charge sheet. The application was rejected by the Chief Judicial Magistrate on 12/04/2010 against which a Revision Petition was preferred which has been allowed by the court below. (4) Learned counsel for the petitioner would argue that the Revisional Court could not have directed for filing of the charge sheet and the Chief Judicial Magistrate has further committed an error by sending a memo to the concerned Police directing it to file supplementary charge sheet by specifically adding name of the persons against Whom the charge sheet is to be filed. Learned counsel g has placed reliance on Ram Naresh Prasad Vs. State of Jharkhand i and others (2009) 11 SCC 299. i (5) On perusal of the impugned order passed by the Additional / , i Sessions Judge on 28/12/2010 (Annexure P-6), more particularly the '7'5" operative part of the said order, it is home out that the Revisional Court has only directed for further investigation in the matter and for that direction has been issued to the Trial Court to send a memo -to the concerned Police for submission of a report. (6) In the matter of State of Bihar and another Vs. J.A.C. Saldanha and others, (1980) 1 SCC 554 the Hon’ble Supreme Court has held thus in paragraph 19 ofthe report as: “19 17w power of the Alagistrate under Section 156 (3) to direct further investigation is clearly an independent power and does not stand in conflict with the power of the State Government as spelt out hereinbgore. Ihe power conferred upon the A/Iagistrate under Section 156 (3) can be exercised by the Magistrate even ty‘ter submission of a report by the investigating opicer which would mean that it would be open to the Magistrate not to accept the conclusion of the investigating 0]?‘icer and direct further investigation. Yhis provision does not in any way Wet the power of the investigating opicer to further investigate the case even after submission of the report as provided in Section 173 (8). Therefore, the High Court was in error in holding that the State Government in exercise of the power ofsuperintendence under Section 3 of the Act lacked the power to direct further investigation into the case. In reaching this conclusion we have kept out of consideration the provision contained in Section 156 (2) that an investigation by m2 q$cer in charge ofa police station, which expression includes police opicer superior in ' rank to such o‘p‘icer, cannot be questioned on the ground that such investigating ojficer had no jurisdiction to carry on the ground that such investigating opicer had no jurisdiction to «(t ‘ i carry on the investigation; otherwise that provision would have been a short answer to the contention raised on behalf of respondent 1. " (7) It appears, though the application was moved under section 173 (8) of Cr.P.C., however the power to be exercised was available to the Magistrate and on his failure to the revisional authority under section 156 (3) of the Cr.P.C. as has been held by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the matter of State of Bihar and another Vs. J.A.C. Saldanha and others (supra). (8) Learned counsel for the petitioner is correct in submitting that the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, while sending the memo, could not have directed the concerned Police to file charge sheet as no such direction was issued by the Revisional Court. It is therefore clarified that the concemed Police shall further investigate the oEence and submit a report as directed by the Revisional Court either in form of charge sheet against the persons found to be involved in the oEence on the basis of further investigation or a final report if no oEence is made out against them. It is clarified that the concerned Police has not been restrained from investigating the matter as per the direction issued by the Sessions Court and a charge sheet is required to be filed if offence is made out. (9) With this observation, the writ petition stands disposed of. Sd/- Prashant Kumar Mishra Judge