- (1.) Leave granted.
(2.) The High court has quashed charge framed against the respondents under S. 308/34 Indian Penal Code and has sequelly quashed proceedings against the respondents under S. 323/34 Indian Penal Code on the ground that the police could not have investigated the said offence without the permission of a magistrate.
(3.) The dispute is between the tenants and the landlords of a premises in Delhi. On 27/9/1992, there was a clash between the two sides. Both sides allegedly were injured. The landlords are the accused in the instant. case. Sunil Kumar is the victim of the crime. After the matter was reported to the police, his medico-legal examination was conducted by the doctor-in-charge, who after enumerating the injuries opined them to be grievous. Dr Dabbas, whom we have summoned today to explain the medico-legal report, was the doctor who supervised and endorsed the report. According to him, the injuries have been termed grievous because two of them were lacerated wounds and one was a haematoma and since the blows were aimed at the head, they had endangered life. The learned Additional Sessions Judge towhom the case was committed had framed charges against the respondents under S. 308/34 Indian Penal Code, the gravamen of the charge being that an attempt to cause culpable homicide not amounting to murder had been made. a whether the injury was grievous or simple deserved a back seat in face of the charge under S. 308/34 Indian Penal Code. Yet the High court when approached in its revisional power under Section 439 of the Code of Criminal Procedure quashed the charge in finding room in the medico-legal report to opine that the injuries were simple. The High court observed as follows: "I have perused the FIR as well as the statement of the witnesses recorded under Section 161 of the Criminal Procedure Code by the police. No person including the complainant has made any allegation in their statements that injuries were inflicted by the petitioners with an intention to cause their death. As already mentioned above, in order to constitute an offence under Section 308, not only it should be proved that the act was committed by the accused but it was committed with the c intention or knowledge to commit culpable homicide not amounting to murder and that offence was committed under such circumstances if the accused by that act had caused death he would have been guilty of culpable homicide. Therefore, the most important circumstance in a case under Section 308 would be that an act should have been committed with intention or knowledge to commit culpable homicide not amounting to murder. The injuries Sustained by the complainant are not such that could in any manner result in the death of the injured persons. The injuries were caused by a blunt object and it was one-and-a-half- inch lacerated wound in the scalp. The doctor who examined the complainant had opined that there was no evidence of head injuries and it did not even require hospitalisation and he was asked to attend the opd the next date. The word 'grievous' against the injuries has been written and had not given any opinion about his alleged head injuries. Merely because an injury has been found on the head, it cannot be said that such an injury was caused with the intention or knowledge to commit culpable homicide not amounting to murder. The evidence and circumstances of the case otherwise show that there was no intention or f knowledge on the part of the accused to cause such injuries which would have resulted in the death of the complainant as a result of which they would have been guilty of murder or culpable homicide not amounting to murder. The fact that the petitioners have also been injured and a case under Section 324 Indian Penal Code has been registered against the complainant clearly shows that it was a scuffle between two parties without any intention on either side to cause injuries which might result in the death of the accused. The material before the Additional Sessions Judge, in my view, was not such which could give rise to grave suspicion against the petitioners of their having the intention or knowledge to cause such an injury that had the death been caused, they would have been guilty of culpable homicide, For the foregoing reasons, I am of the considered opinion that the petitioners. could not have been charged for an offence punishable under S. 308/34 Indian Penal Code. ";