Full Judgment
M.C. Desai, J.
1. The sarpanch of a nyaya panchayat and certain panchcs and the applicants have been committed to stand trial for the offences of Sections 120B, 466, 218 and 193 I. P. C. The gist of the allegations against them is that in a case that was tried by them they forged a summons, order sheet and registers and prepared false evidence to be used against the accused in another case. The proceedings were started against the applicants on a private complaint and it was contended before me that under Section 195 (1)(b) Cr. P. C. they could not be prosecuted for the offences of Sections 193, 466 and 120B, I. P. G. without a complaint in writing by a Court.
Here the offences are alleged to have been committed by a court trying a case and not by other persons in, or in relation to, the- proceedings before it. The obvious meaning of the provision of Section 195 (1) (b) is that if the offences are committed in, or in relation to, a proceeding pending in any court cognizance of them cannot be taken except on a complaint by the court, (or by some count to which it is subordinate). This provision cannot I apply when the presiding officer of a court itself is alleged to have committed the offences, for the simple reason that it would be absurd to require that he cannot be prosecuted except on a complaint made by himself.
It is true that the provision allows a complaint to be made by a court to which the court is subordinate; but this is permitted not on the ground that it would be absurd to require a complaint by the inferior court but on the ground that the inferior court has refused or failed to make a complaint. The provision empowering a superior court to make a complaint is applicable in those cases only in which the inferior court has the power, and can be expected, to make a complaint.
If the provision about the inferior court's making a complaint is inapplicable in a certain case the provision empowering the superior court to make a complaint also is inapplicable. The present application is filed not by the sarpanch and the panches but by other persons including a process-server of the nyaya panchayat, but all these offences are said to have been committed in furtherance of a conspiracy entered into by the applicants, the sarpanch and the panches. In these circumstances, the provision that a court cannot take cognizance of the offences' alleged to have been committed by the applicants except on a complaint by the nyaya Panchayat can have no application; the sarpanch and the panches of the nyaya panchayat, who themselves hatched the conspiracy with the applicants could not be required to make a complaint against them and Section 195 (1) (b) in its entirety is not meant to apply in such a case.
2. Section 479A, Cr. P. C., also is not applicable. Some of the applicants gave evidence in the case under Section 323, I. P. C. before the nyaya panchayat but they are not being prosecuted for any perjury committed by them while giving evidence; they are being prosecuted for fabricating false evidence of refusal of the accused of that case to receive the summons. Section 479A has no application to such prosecution.
3. No case is made out for quashing the commitment and the application is dismissed.