Summary
The Court held maintainable a provident-fund adjudicating officer’s complaint under Section 228 IPC for obstruction and insult during Section 7A proceedings. Their statutorily deemed judicial character had to be given effect for Section 195(1)(b)(i) CrPC; deciding whether the authority was otherwise a court was unnecessary. It rejected the claimed need to approach the appellate tribunal and set aside the High Court’s acquittal on maintainability grounds.
Issues
- Whether the judicial character of Section 7A proceedings supported the officer’s Section 228 complaint.
- Whether the complaint had to be routed through the appellate tribunal.
Held
- Section 7A proceedings carried statutory power to take evidence on oath and were deemed judicial proceedings for Sections 193 and 228 IPC. That fiction had to reach its logical conclusion: for the relevant Section 195 safeguard the proceeding could be equated with one in court, without separately deciding the authority’s general court status. (¶ 5–6)
- Following Lalji Haridas, the complaint for insult or interruption to a public servant sitting in such a judicial proceeding could proceed from that officer himself. The High Court had wrongly treated the asserted absence of a court as defeating maintainability. (¶ 6)
- The contention that a Section 340 complaint first had to be filed before the appellate tribunal rather than the jurisdictional Magistrate was rejected. (¶ 7–9)
Result
Appeal allowed; High Court order acquitting the respondent on the complaint-maintainability ground set aside.