Patiala House Court, New Delhi: In an application filed under Section 156(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (‘CrPC’), seeking registration of the First Information Report (‘FIR’) against the Bank of Baroda (BoB), Yashdeep Chahal, J. ordered the registration of FIR against the Bank of Baroda and Yash Enterprises for forged and fabricated FIR document against the Complainant.
Factual Matrix
The Complainant has availed a credit card issued by the BoB. Upon non-payment of the bill of the credit card, the complainant and his employer received calls for recovery from the Bank and it was alleged that the callers had threatened him with police action. The Complainant’s employer also received a PDF file on WhatsApp purporting to be the copy FIR filed against the Complainant at Connaught Place Police Station. Upon checking the said FIR, it was found to be a forged and fabricated document. It was also alleged that certain persons wearing police uniform had arrived at the house of the complainant and tried to extort a certain sum of money from the complainant.
Court’s Order
The Court said that the law regarding an application under Section 156(3) CrPC is well settled and it is an accepted proposition of law that although the Magistrate has power to direct the police to register a case and initiate investigation, the same should be exercised judiciously and not in a mechanical manner. The Court referred to Sukhwasi v. State of Uttar Pradesh, 2007 SCC OnLine All 1088, wherein it was observed that the objective of the police investigation is collection of evidence regarding the offence. Therefore, police investigation is deemed necessary in those cases where the evidence was neither in the possession of the complainant nor can be produced by the witnesses on being summoned at the instance of the complainant or where the nature of the evidence is technical.
Therefore, the Court said that the registration of the FIR is warranted on the following grounds:
- The allegations made in the complaint reveal the commission of a cognizable offence.
- The allegations are of a nature that warrants an investigation by the police/ state agency.
- The Complainant is unable to establish its case without police investigation in the matter.
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An enquiry under Section 202 of CrPC would be inadequate for a just and thorough elucidation of the truthfulness of the facts of the case.
The Court said that the facts of the complaint, prima facie, reveal that the complainant and his employer received threatening calls along with forged and fabricated copy of the FIR through WhatsApp, and these allegations are serious in nature. The Court also said that the allegations were substantiated by the Complainant by placing on record the copy of the forged FIR as well as the mobile numbers of the alleged persons. Further, the Court said that it was clear that certain cognizable offences were committed, and thus, elaborate police investigation was required to unearth the truth.
However, the Court denied the Complainant’s plea to file an FIR against the manager of the Bank as no specific allegations were made against him. Further, the Court said that it cannot be denied that recovery agents were working on behalf of the Bank to recover the amount. The Court also noted that the calls were made from a registered number in the name of Yash Enterprises and the company had admitted the fact that they made the calls through auto dialing mode. Therefore, the Court said that an enquiry under Section 202 of CrPC was not sufficient to extract the truth.
Thus, the Court said that an FIR must be registered under Sections 415, 419, 465, 468, 471 of the Penal Code, 1860, (‘IPC’) read with Section 66-D of the Information Technology Act, 2000, against the Bank of Baroda Financial Solutions Limited (Credit Card Subsidiary) of BoB and against Yash Enterprises.
The Court also said that the Investigation Officer (‘I.O.’) was at liberty to investigate the matter from all possible aspects and not restrict the investigation to the accused entities. The I.O. was also directed to obtain the record of recovery agents working on behalf of the Bank and initiate a thorough investigation to identify the callers in question.
The matter was further listed for hearing on 01-06-2023.
[Satish Kumar v. Bank of Baroda, 2023 SCC OnLine Dis Crt (Del) 6, Order Dated: 12-05-2023]
Advocates who appeared in this case :
Advocate Gurmukh Singh Arora and Advocate Manas Sharma.