Cross-border cheating prosecutions need statutory sanction when part of the deception occurs outside India.

Cheating requires deception and dishonest or fraudulent inducement, and where the misleading material was sent from India but received and acted on in Malaya, part of the offence was committed outside India. In that situation, the territorial reach of Indian criminal process was governed by the provision equivalent to Section 188 CrPC, so a certificate or sanction under its first proviso was required before an Indian court could assume jurisdiction. In the absence of that statutory approval, the prosecution could not proceed and the proceedings were quashed.

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Issues: Whether, in a prosecution for cheating, the Indian court had jurisdiction when a part of the alleged deception took place outside India and the certificate contemplated by the first proviso to Section 188 of the Criminal Procedure Code was absent.

Analysis: Cheating under Section 415 of the Indian Penal Code requires deception and dishonest or fraudulent inducement. On the facts, the pamphlets sent from India reached the complainants in Malaya, and the deceit was complete only when they received and acted upon them. That brought at least part of the offence within Malaya. Once part of the offence was committed outside India, Section 188 of the Criminal Procedure Code applied, and the statutory requirement of a certificate or sanction as contemplated by its first proviso became necessary before an Indian court could assume jurisdiction. The preliminary objection regarding time did not succeed because the challenge was directed against the order refusing relief under Section 188, not against the original charge.

Conclusion: The prosecution could not proceed in the absence of the required sanction or certificate, and the Magistrate's order and the pending proceedings were quashed.

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