CIVIL COURT CAN’T ASK POLICE TO INVESTIGATE AN OFFENCE: HC

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Wednesday ruled that a civil court had no power to direct the police to investigate an offence or register an FIR. A magistrate, however, could ask the police to probe an offence by the power vested in him by the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC).

The HC passed the order during criminal proceedings against Harishchandra Chavan, 78, and his 35-year-old son Santosh, residents of Nandgaon in Beed district.

The father-son duo had filed a civil suit against one Ashok Shinde at Ambejogai to secure right of way to a piece of their land.

While responding to the suit, Shinde made counter allegations in his protest application filed in the civil court, and the judge issued an order to the Bardapur police to register an FIR, investigate the complaint and file a report.

“The action of the civil judge (junior division) diverting a civil proceeding to criminal complaint and initiating penal action against the plaintiffs at the behest of defendant, appears somewhat strange,” said the division bench of Justice SS Shinde and Justice KK Sonawane, while quashing the case.

The high court accepted the duo’s contentions saying that the presiding officer of the civil court should not have exercised powers conferred by the CrPC on a magistrate. “

“The presiding officer overlooked the law and exercised the powers of a magistrate. He should have remembered that he was dealing with civil proceedings and not a criminal complaint,” said the bench.