Holder in due course requirement bars a widow from maintaining a cheque dishonour complaint after the payee's death.

Under the Negotiable Instruments Act, a complaint under Section 138 can be maintained only by the payee or a holder in due course. A legal heir or the payee's wife does not automatically acquire that status merely by virtue of death or relationship; holder in due course requires possession for consideration before overdue and without notice of defect in title. On those principles, the wife who presented the cheque after the payee's death lacked statutory locus standi, and the prosecution was held not maintainable.

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Issues: Whether the wife of the payee, who presented the cheque after the payee's death, was a 'holder in due course' and therefore competent to maintain a complaint under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881.

Analysis: The statutory scheme of Sections 138 and 142 permits prosecution only by the payee or by the holder in due course of the cheque. Section 9 defines a holder in due course as a person who becomes possessor of the instrument for consideration and before it becomes overdue, without notice of defect in title. Mere possession of the cheque by a legal heir or relative does not satisfy that definition. The Court disagreed with the view that an heir steps automatically into the shoes of the deceased payee for the purposes of criminal prosecution under Section 138. It held that inheritance or status as wife does not, by itself, confer the statutory capacity to institute a complaint.

Conclusion: The respondent was not a holder in due course and had no locus standi to file the complaint under Section 138. The prosecution was not maintainable.

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