https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=410803 A National Lok Adalat acting on a referred complaint is confined to exploring compromise or settlement under the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987; if no settlement is reached, it must return the record to the referring court and cannot exercise criminal court powers. Section 256 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 is not available to the Lok Adalat, so the complainant's non-appearance could not justify stopping the proceedings and acquitting the accused. The impugned order was therefore without jurisdiction and unsustainable. en-us Mon, 02 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0530 Mon, 09 Aug 2021 21:38:00 +0530 TaxTMI RSS Generator https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=410803 A National Lok Adalat acting on a referred complaint is confined to exploring compromise or settlement under the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987; if no settlement is reached, it must return the record to the referring court and cannot exercise criminal court powers. Section 256 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 is not available to the Lok Adalat, so the complainant's non-appearance could not justify stopping the proceedings and acquitting the accused. The impugned order was therefore without jurisdiction and unsustainable. Case-Laws Indian Laws Mon, 02 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0530 https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=410803