Pendyala Veerabhadrarao and another vs State of A.P. and another

N. Ravishankar, J.—The point that arises for determination in this petition is whether there are grounds to quash the F.I.R. in crime No. 13 of 2009 of Police Station, Central Crime Station (CCS), Hyderabad registered for the offence punishable u/s 498A read with Section 34 of Indian Penal Code, 1860. Heard Smt. P. Rajeswari, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners'' counsel, the learned Additional Public Prosecutor and Sri P. Raviteja, the learned counsel for respondent No. 2.

The first petitioner is stated to be husband and the second petitioner is mother-in-law of the de facto complainant who is the second respondent herein. The main plea of the petitioners is that the allegations in the complaint would show that the offence alleged took place at Chodavaram in Visakhapatnam District and not anywhere else including Hyderabad where the CCS Police Station is located. Their further plea is that in the above circumstances, the concerned police station which has registered the above F.I.R. has no jurisdiction to register it and therefore it should be quashed.

The learned counsel for petitioners relied upon a decision of this Court given in Md. Abdul Hakeem v. State of A.P. (1) 2010 (3) ALT (Crl.) 212 (A.P.) in support of her contention that the F.I.R. in question should be quashed. It may be noted that in this case, this Court quashed the very C.C. itself on the ground that the court which entertained the charge-sheet has no territorial jurisdiction to deal with it. This decision cannot be applied here as the matter is still at the stage of investigation.

The learned counsel for the second respondent relied upon two decisions of the Supreme Court given in Satvinder Kaur Vs. State (Govt. of N.C.T. of Delhi) and Another, and Rasiklal Dalpatram Thakkar v. State of Gujrat (3) Rasiklal Dalpatram Thakkar Vs. State of Gujarat and Others, It may be noted that in case of Satvinder Kaur (2 supra), it has been laid down by the Supreme Court that inherent powers of the High Court cannot be exercised to quash an F.I.R. on the ground that the investigation officer has no territorial jurisdiction to investigate the offence and police officer cannot refuse to register F.I.R. or to investigate for want of territorial jurisdiction. In the case of Rasiklal Dalpatram Thakkar (3 supra), again the same principle has been laid down by the Supreme Court, but of-course the principle laid down therein is once there is a direction by a Magistrate for investigation u/s 156(3), the investigating agency cannot refrain from conducting enquiry on the ground that it has no territorial jurisdiction to investigate an offence.

According to the above decisions, it follows that this Court cannot interfere and quash the present case which is at the stage of investigation. It shall be open for the police to go ahead with the investigation and complete their job. It shall be always open for the petitioners to raise their objections, if charge-sheet is filed. The concerned police are directed to strictly keep in view Section 41 of Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 as it stands today before taking a decision regarding their arrest. The criminal petition is accordingly dismissed.