State of Haryana vs Cheeka Coop.Credit Service Society and ors.

G. S. Chahal, J. (Oral)

The Checks Coop. Credit Services Society, Cheeks, and others are being prosecuted for contravention of clause 19(i)(a) of the Fertilizer Control JUDGMENT 1985, before the Presiding Officer. Special Court, Kurukshetra. After part of the evidence was recorded, the prosecution moved an application u/s 311 Cr.P.C. for summoning Kartar Singh Beldar, Subhash Gupta and Balwant Ram Messenger, as additional witnesses to prove the fact that the sample remained intact till its delivery to the Laboratory. The names of these witnesses had not been mentioned in the list of witnesses attached to the complaint. The respondent contested the application and vide detailed order dated 11121990, the Special Court rejected this application. The State of Haryana has come up with this criminal miscellaneous u/s 482 Cr.P.C. for setting aside that order

Sh. H.S. Gill, Sr. Advocate, who appears for the respondents, has taken a preliminary objection to the competency of this criminal miscellaneous. His argument is to the effect that the impugned order is interlocutory and no criminal miscellaneous was competent in view of the provisions of section 397 Cr.P.C. and the jurisdiction of this Court u/s 482, Cr.P.C. could not be invoked to circumvent the bar placed by section 397. He relies upon Chander Bhan v. State of Haryana, 1979 CLR 253; Brij Mohan v. State of Haryana and anr., 1987(2) Recent Criminal Report 646 : 1987(2) CLR 550 and V. P. Gureja v. Jagdish Chander Raheja, 1988(2) RCR 179 . In Chander Bhan''s case (supra), the following propositions had been laid down :

(a) that order allowing or disallowing additional evidence amonted to an interlocutory order and revision there against was barred in view of the provisions of section 397 (2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure; and

(b) that inherent powers of the High Court under section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure could not be ordinarily invoked for setting aside such an order except in, rarest cases of the abuse of the process of the Court."

This judgment was based on the following observations of the Supreme Court in Amar Nath and Ors. v. State of Haryana and Ors. AIR 1977 SC 2185 :

"A harmonious construction of Sections 397 and 482 would lead to the irresistible conclusion that where a particular order is expresslybarred under Section 397(2) and cannot be the subject of revision by the High Court then to such a case the provisions of Section 482 would not apply. It was well settled that the inherent powers of the Court can ordinarily be exercised when there is no express provision on the subject matter. Where there is an express provision, barring a particular remedy, the Court cannot resort to the exercise of inherent powers."

I agree with the contention raised by Sh. Gill. The impugned order of the Special Court being interlocutory in nature, could not be interfered with in revision by this Court and the provisions of section 397(2) Cr.PC cannot he invoked to circumvent that bar. I hereby dismiss the criminal miscellaneous.