TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2016 (2) TMI 1334
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....4, the complaint under Section 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 (for brevity "the Act") filed by the petitioners-complainant was ordered to be returned to enable him to present the same before a Court of competent jurisdiction. Brief facts of the case are that the respondentsaccused in order to discharge his liability, issued a cheque bearing No. 870049 dated 23.03.2013 for Rs. 7,50,000/- drawn on Punjab National Bank, Chail Chowk, Mandi (HP) in favour of the petitioners-complainant. The petitioners-complainant presented the said cheque to his Banker i.e. Allahabad Bank, Vardman Branch, Chandigarh Road, Ludhiana but same was dishonoured by the bank of respondents-accused vide memo dated 26.03.2013. Petitioners thereafter served a no....
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...., complaint was ordered to be returned to the complainant for its presentation before the competent Court of jurisdiction. Subsequent thereto, the Ministry of Law and Justice (Legislative Department) issued the Negotiable Instruments (Amendment) Ordinance, 2015, which came into force on 15th June, 2015. The aforesaid ordinance carried out the amendment in Section 142 of the Act, which reads as under:- "3. In the principal Act, Section 142 shall be numbered as sub-section (1) thereof and after subsection (1) as so numbered, the following subsection shall be inserted, namely:- (2) The offence under Section 138 shall be inquired into and tried only by a court within whose local jurisdiction:- (a) if the cheque is delivered for collect....
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....t the summoning and appearance of the alleged accused, the recording of evidence has commenced as envisaged in Section 145(2) of the Act, will proceed to continue at the place where they are filed. Said para reads as under:- "20. We are quite alive to the magnitude of the impact that the present decision shall have to possibly lakhs of cases pending in various Courts spanning across the country. One approach could be to declare that this judgment will have only prospective pertinence, i.e. applicability to Complaints that may be filed after this pronouncement. However, keeping in perspective the hardship that this will continue to bear on alleged accused/respondents who may have to travel long distances in conducting their defence, and al....