Renjith R vs State Of Kerala

Shircy V, J

Apprehending arrest in connection with Crime No.691 of 2021 of Kollam East Police Station registered for the offences punishable under Sections 406 and 420 r/w Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code, these petitioners have moved this application under Section 438 of the Code of Criminal Procedure.

The prosecution allegation in short is as follows :-

The petitioners are the officials of a private finance company namely "Maben Nidhi Limited", having its' Head office at Valappad in Thrissur District. The defacto complainant has approached the finance establishment for availing a loan of Rs.10 lakhs. The petitioners have considered the loan application and the loan was sanctioned for the said amount. Then, she executed an agreement agreeing to repay the amount by instalments. Thereafter, she realized that in the agreement the interest fixed for the loan was 22%, though she was informed that the interest rate will only be 16% at the time of availing the loan. The petitioners have actually forged the documents and fixed the rate of interest as 22% with an intention to cheat the defacto complainant and thereby committed the aforesaid offences.

Heard the learned counsel for the petitioners as well the learned Public Prosecutor.

According to the learned counsel for the petitioners, it is true that the defacto complainant has approached the Finance Company for a loan of Rs.10 lakhs in the month of November, 2020 and she executed an agreement (Annexure-II) with sureties agreeing to repay the amount with an interest @ 20% and 2% as service charge and thereafter, remitted 3 instalments. Then she requested the Company to reduce the rate of interest and thereafter a discussion was conducted and thus the interest was reduced to 18% per anum and re-structured the loan with the reduced rate of interest and Annexure-IV is the document evidencing the same. Thereafter, she failed to pay the instalments promptly. Then an arbitration notice was issued in favour of the defacto complainant as well the sureties. Annexure-V is the notice issued by the legal officer of the Finance Company and the same was received for the defacto complainant on 17.05.2021 itself. Annexure-VII is the copy of the document evidencing receipt of this notice issued by the Company. All on a sudden, she filed a complaint and the case has been registered on 28.06.2021 alleging that these petitioners have cheated her. In fact, there is no question of cheating at all. The first agreement was executed by her, when she availed the loan agreeing to pay an interest @ 22% and thereafter, as per her requests the interest rate was reduced to 18%.

It is also pointed out by the learned counsel for the petitioners that she had even remitted 3 instalments with interest @ 22% per anum as per the agreement dated 05.11.2020. But this case has been falsely implicated by her, to wreck vengeance upon them and hence this application.

The learned Public Prosecutor has submitted that the investigation of the case is only proceeding with.

The documents produced by the learned counsel for the petitioners would show that this is purely a money transaction between the parties and the defacto complainant in fact approached the Company for a loan and an agreement was executed with sureties. As per the agreement, she remitted 3 instalments and then requested to reduce the interest, which was also considered by the Company.

It is not evident from the materials as such available before me that the custodial interrogation of these petitioners are necessary for the investigating agency to proceed with the matter. The dispute appears to be predominantly of civil flavour. Such being the case, I think that this application for pre-arrest bail can be considered subject to the following conditions :-

(i) The petitioners shall be released on bail on executing a bond for a sum of Rs.1,00,000/- (Rupees one lakh only) each with two solvent sureties for the like sum each to the satisfaction of the investigating officer in the event of their arrest.

(ii) They shall appear before the Investigating Officer for interrogation as and when required by him, in writing.

(iii)They shall co-operate with the investigation and trial of the case.

(iv) They shall not directly or indirectly, make any inducement, threat or promise to any person acquainted with the facts of the case so as to dissuade him from disclosing such facts to the court or to any police officer or tamper with the evidence.

(v)They shall not commit any offence while on bail.

In case of violation of any of the above conditions, the learned Magistrate is empowered to cancel the bail in accordance with the law.