Post-dated cheque defence under the NI Act cannot defeat quashing at the threshold; compounding remains open.

In a Section 482 CrPC challenge to a Section 138 NI Act complaint, the Allahabad HC held that a defence that the cheque was post-dated and allegedly not issued towards a legally enforceable debt could not be examined at the quashing stage because the statutory presumptions under Sections 139 and 140 operate and the issue must be tested at trial. It also noted that the offence remains compoundable under Section 147 NI Act and directed that, if a compounding application is moved within ten days, the trial court should decide it in accordance with Supreme Court precedent, while no coercive arrest was to be made for that period.

---

---

Issues: Whether the summoning order and complaint proceedings under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 were liable to be quashed on the ground that the cheque was post-dated and allegedly not issued towards a legally enforceable debt, and whether the applicant could be permitted to seek compounding of the offence.

Analysis: The petition was filed under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 to quash the summoning order and the complaint proceedings. The defence that the cheque was post-dated and not issued in discharge of a legally enforceable debt was held to be unavailable at that stage in view of the statutory presumptions under Sections 139 and 140 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881, and such defence could only be examined during trial. At the same time, Section 147 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 makes the offence compoundable, and the Court directed that if an application for compounding was moved within ten days, the trial court should decide it in accordance with the law laid down by the Supreme Court.

Conclusion: The prayer to quash was not accepted, but limited relief was granted by permitting the applicant to move for compounding and by directing that no coercive arrest be made for ten days.

---