Nobody can take forcible possession of property: Court

Nobody can be allowed to take the law in their hands, a trial court said while convicting three people in a trespassing-cum-assault case. “If people are allowed to take the law in their own hands or enter residential premises to take forcible possession of properties, then society will be ruined,” the court stated.

Additional sessions judge Sanjeev Jain upheld the sentence passed by a magisterial court and denied benefit of probation to the three convicts in a nearly 27-year-old case. The court noted that facts were successfully proved against the convicts, Chander Mohan, SD Bhandari and Nathi Lal. According to prosecution, the trio had forcibly entered the house of Sahab Pyari Mishra on 3 March 1988 and assaulted her and her daughter with a sharp-edged and blunt object over a property dispute.

The magisterial court had convicted Mohan under Section 326 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt) and Section 452 (house trespass) of IPC and sentenced him to one year in jail with a fine of Rs 2,000. Bhandari and Lal were convicted for offences under Section 323 (voluntarily causing hurt) and Section 452 of IPC and were sentenced for six months and fined Rs 1,000 each.