TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2025 (6) TMI 2076
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....Balaji Traders, carrying out the business of betel nut leaves. Sanjay Gupta Hereinafter 'accused', allegedly started a business under the same name, and litigations are pending between the parties with respect to Trademark and Copyright claims. On 22nd May, 2022, when the complainant was heading towards his house, the accused, along with three unknown persons carrying rifles in their hands, stopped and threatened him to close down his business of betel nut. They further threatened that he could carry on the business only if he would pay five lakhs per month to the accused person. On the complainant's refusal, the accused persons not only beat him but also tried to kidnap him. On failure of police to register First Information Report FIR, he approached the Court by filing a complaint u/s 200 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 Hereinafter referred to as 'CrPC'. 3. Pursuant to this complaint, the Trial Court Court of Additional Sessions Judge/Special Judge(Dacoit Prabhav Area) Jalaun Place Orai after analyzing the oral and documentary evidence available, found a prima facie case against the accused person and issued summons to him u/s 387 IPC. 4. Being aggrieved, the ac....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....rting to the facts of the present case, it is imperative to acknowledge that IPC provides for offences, their ingredients, and their distinct punishments. The relevant Sections of extortion defined in Chapter XVII of IPC are reproduced below : "Section 383 defines Extortion: Whoever intentionally puts any person in fear of any injury to that person, or to any other, and thereby dishonestly induces the person so put in fear to deliver to any person any property or valuable security or anything signed or sealed which may be converted into a valuable security, commits "extortion". Section 384 Punishment for extortion: Whoever commits extortion shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years, or with fine, or with both; Section 385 Putting person in fear of injury in order to commit extortion-Whoever, in order to the committing of extortion, puts any person in fear, or attempts to put any person in fear, of any injury, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to two years, or with fine, or with both. Section 386 Extortion by putting a person in fear of d....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....n 384. Sections 386 and 388 provide for an aggravated form of extortion. These sections deal with the actual commission of an act of extortion, whereas Sections 385, 387 and 389 IPC seek to punish for an act committed for the purpose of extortion even though the act of extortion may not be complete and property not delivered. It is in the process of committing an offence that a person is put in fear of injury, death or grievous hurt. Section 387 IPC provides for a stage prior to committing extortion, which is putting a person in fear of death or grievous hurt 'in order to commit extortion', similar to Section 385 IPC. Hence, Section 387 IPC is an aggravated form of 385 IPC, not 384 IPC. 11. Having deliberated upon the offence of extortion and its forms, we proceed to analyze the essentials of both Sections, i.e., 383 and 387 IPC, the High Court dealt with. 12. The essential ingredients of extortion under Section 383 IPC, as laid down by this Court in R.S. Nayak v. A.R. Antulay (1986) 2 SCC 716, are : "60. ...The main ingredients of the offence are: (i) the accused must put any person in fear of injury to that person or any other person; (ii)....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
.... SCC 722 a three-Judge Bench of this Court upheld the conviction under Section 387 IPC, along with other provisions, on the facts, where the deceased was tied with an iron chain and rope to a cot and threatened to part with crores of rupees or else execute the document in their favour. On his failure to do so, the deceased was killed. Thus, even though there was no delivery of property, the conviction was upheld by observing that Section 387 IPC is a heightened, more serious form of the offence of extortion in which the victim is put in fear of death or grievous hurt. 17. After going through the penal provisions related to extortion, it is also imperative to peruse the necessary principles of quashing, laid down by this Court through various judicial pronouncements which govern the jurisdiction of the High Court under Section 482 CrPC. 18. This Court in B.N. John v. State of U.P. 2025 SCC OnLine SC 7, reiterated several principles of quashing criminal cases/complaints/FIR as laid down, back in the days in Bhajan Lal (supra) : "102. In the backdrop of the interpretation of the various relevant provisions of the Code under Chapter XIV and of the principles of law enunc....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....de and/or where the proceeding is maliciously instituted with an ulterior motive for wreaking vengeance on the accused and with a view to spite him due to private and personal grudge." In Dalip Kaur v. Jagnar Singh (2009) 14 SCC 696 - 11. There cannot furthermore be any doubt that the High Court would exercise its inherent jurisdiction only when one or the other propositions of law, as laid down in R. Kalyani v. Janak C. Mehta [(2009) 1 SCC 516 : (2009) 1 SCC (Cri) 567] is attracted, which are as under: (SCC p. 523, para 15) "(1) The High Court ordinarily would not exercise its inherent jurisdiction to quash a criminal proceeding and, in particular, a first information report unless the allegations contained therein, even if given face value and taken to be correct in their entirety, disclosed no cognizable offence. (2) For the said purpose the Court, save and except in very exceptional circumstances, would not look to any document relied upon by the defence. (3) Such a power should be exercised very sparingly. If the allegations made in the FIR disclose commission of an offence, the Court shall not go beyond the same and pass an order in favo....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....78 at p. 295 (HL)] : (AC p. 295) "... Where penalties for infringement are imposed it is not legitimate to stretch the language of a rule, however, beneficent its intention, beyond the fair and ordinary meaning of its language." 21. In M. Narayanan Nambiar v. State of Kerala 1962 SCC OnLine SC 85, this Court reiterated the observations made by the Privy Council in respect of the interpretation of penal statutes : "10. A decision of the Judicial Committee in 'Francis Hart Dyke (Appellant) and Henry William Elliott, and the owners of the steamtug or Vessel 'Gauntlet' [ Law Reports Privy Council Appeals (4) 1872, p. 184] cited by the learned counsel as an aid for construction neatly states the principle and therefore may be extracted : Lord Justice James speaking for the Board observes at p. 19: "No doubt all penal Statutes are to be construed strictly, that is to say, the Court must see that the thing charged as an offence is within the plain meaning of the words used, and must not strain the words on any notion that there has been a slip, that there has been a casus omissus, that the thing is so clearly within the mischief that it must have been int....
X X X X Extracts X X X X
X X X X Extracts X X X X
....ope of the provision cannot be extended by reading into it words which are not there. Section 387 IPC, being a penal provision, has to be strictly interpreted, and no condition/essential ingredient can be read into it that the Statute/Section does not prescribe. Since there is no ambiguity in the ingredients of Section 387 IPC, the observations of Tolaram Relumal (supra) as contended by the learned counsel appearing for Respondent No.2 would not come to his rescue. 25. The reasoning adopted by the High Court is, on the face of it, flawed and misplaced. When the Legislature has created two separate offences with distinct ingredients and punishments, then assigning the essential ingredient of one to another is not a correct approach adopted by the High Court. Nowhere does the Section say that extortion has to be committed while putting a person in fear of death or grievous hurt. Instead, it is the other way around, that is to say, putting a person in fear of death or grievous hurt to commit extortion. Extortion is not yet committed; it is in the process of committing it that a person is put in fear. Putting a person in fear would make an accused guilty of an offence under Section ....