TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2009 (7) TMI 1365
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....er of some agricultural lands. He entered into an agreement for sale with the respondent No. 2 agreeing to sell 13 acres of land at the rate of Rs. 4,70,000/- per acre. Allegedly, respondent No. 2 is said to be a property dealer. He paid a sum of Rs. 7,00,000/- towards advance to the appellant. A sum of Rs. 14,20,000/- was furthermore paid to the appellant within a period of seven months from the date of execution of the said sale agreement. 4 . Inter alia, on the premise that the second respondent was unable to pay the balance amount of consideration, the appellant executed a deed of sale in favour of Balbir Singh and Mohinder Singh. Whereas the case of the appellant is that it was at the instance of the respondent No. 2, the said deed of....
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....was promised to return till 10.06.2006 & it was also written, if accused persons could not return Rs. 14,20,000/- till 10.06.2006, the agreement to sell will remain intact and amount of Rs. 7,80,000/- given by the accused will be forfeited in favour of the complainant. The accused persons did not return the money of Rs. 14,20,000/- till 10.06.2006, so we reached at their home at village Khokhar on 10.06.2006. The accused has promised us to give that amount on 20.06.2006. But accused still did not return the amount, when we reached on 20.06.2006 to take our money, we came to know that accused have sold the land which was subject matter of the agreement, to Balbir Singh, Mohinder Singh sons of Mohar Singh son of Rulia Singh etc. R/o village T....
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....ellant, would urge that the allegations made in the first information report, even if given face value and taken to be correct in its entirety, does not constitute an offence under Section 406 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code. 9. Mr. Vivek Sharma, learned Counsel appearing on behalf of the respondent, on the other hand, supported the impugned judgment contending that the appellants not only sold the land to other persons but also deliberately refused to return a huge amount of Rs. 22,00,000/-, despite having made promise therefor. 10. Sections 405 and 415 of the Indian Penal Code defining 'criminal breach of trust' and 'cheating' respectively read as under: 405 - Criminal breach of trust.-Whoever, being in any manner ent....
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....ing which he would not do or omit. 12. The High Court, therefore, should have posed a question as to whether any act of inducement on the part of the appellant has been raised by the second respondent and whether the appellant had an intention to cheat him from the very inception. If the dispute between the parties was essentially a civil dispute resulting from a breach of contract on the part of the appellants by non-refunding the amount of advance the same would not constitute an offence of cheating. Similar is the legal position in respect of an offence of criminal breach of trust having regard to its definition contained in Section 405 of the Indian Penal Code. SeeAjay Mitra v. State of M.P. 2003CriLJ1249 . 13. There cannot furthermor....