Jammu & Kashmir High Court: A Single Judge Bench of Sanjay Kumar Gupta, J., dismissed a petition filed under Section 561-A of the Jammu & Kashmir Criminal Procedure Code, 1889 (CrPC), whereby the order of framing of charge passed by the Additional Sessions Judge, Jammu, was challenged.
The respondent/complainant was traveling in his car along with his family members when petitioners in their car and a bike started following the respondent’s car. The petitioners were sometimes coming in front of the respondent’s car and sometimes behind it. On enquiring about the actions of petitioners, the respondent and his wife were beaten by the petitioners with a baseball stick. The respondent cried for help and some passerby intervened and the petitioner fled away from the scene thereafter.
The main issue that arose before the Court was whether the order of the ASJ suffered from any sort of legal infirmities.
The Court observed that according to the reports of the doctor, the injuries received by petitioner and his wife were not grievous in nature, however, non-seriousness of injuries should not be a criterion for framing charges against the accused. Factors such as place of injury; the intentions of accused at the time of inflicting the injuries, weapon of offence with which injuries are caused and other circumstances of the case must be kept in mind while framing the charges. The Court observed that in the instant case, the petitioners dragged the respondents out of their car and started beating them, it was only after the respondent started making hue and cry, some pedestrians gathered and saved the respondent and his wife. Had some person not come on spot, respondent and his wife would have been killed by the accused persons.
The Court held that considering the totality of facts and circumstances of the case, the ASJ did not commit any error while framing charges against the accused under Sections 307, 504 and 506 of the Ranbir Penal Code. Resultantly, the petition was dismissed.[Babloo Kumar v. State of J&K,2018 SCC OnLine J&K 834, order dated 16-11-2018]