Section 91 CrPC discovery in cheque dishonour cases may be refused when it is unnecessary for the defence and turns litigation into accounts inquiry.

Section 91 CrPC may be invoked broadly, but in a Section 138 NI Act prosecution the request must still be necessary to the defence and relevant to the issues in dispute. The accused may rebut the statutory presumption under Section 139, yet documents cannot be compelled where they are not needed to show absence of a legally recoverable debt and would instead turn the criminal complaint into a civil-style accounts inquiry. The court upheld rejection of the application for production of documents.

---

---

Issues: Whether the accused was entitled to summons under Section 91 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 for production of documents from the complainant in a prosecution under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881.

Analysis: The scope of Section 91 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 is wide, but its invocation must be tested against the nature of the prosecution and the relevance of the documents sought. In a complaint under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881, the complainant's case is founded on dishonour of the cheque and the statutory presumption under Section 139 operates in favour of the holder of the cheque. The accused can rebut that presumption by appropriate defence, but the sought documents were found unnecessary for establishing absence of legally recoverable debt and would amount to treating the criminal proceeding like a civil inquiry into accounts and set-off.

Conclusion: The request for production of documents under Section 91 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 was not warranted, and the rejection of the application was upheld.

Ratio Decidendi: In a prosecution under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881, documents sought by the accused under Section 91 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 may be refused where they are not necessary for the defence and would merely convert the criminal proceeding into a civil accounting exercise, especially when the accused retains the burden of rebutting the statutory presumption under Section 139.

---