S.41A Notice By Police Under CrPC Is Mandatory For Offences Punishable Upto 7 Yrs Of Imprisonment: Telangana High Court

Brief Facts

The Criminal Petition was filed under Section 438 CrPC for anticipatory bail in crimes registered under Section 354B (Assault or use of criminal force to woman with intent to disrobe) and 506 (punishment for criminal intimidation) of Indian Penal Code.

The petitioners, husband and wife, who are the Accused are the tenants of a shop in house in Attapur, Ranga Reddy District. The de-facto complainant is daughter in law of the owner of the said house.

It was contended that the de-facto complainant, after the demise of her husband, has been harassing her parents-in-law for transfer of property in her name. Her parents-in-law even filed a Writ Petition against the de-facto complainant.

The petitioners/accused in this case submitted that they were only tenants of the subject house and the de-facto complainant created nuisance in the rented shop of the petitioners and mishandled them. It was submitted that the petitioners had not committed any offence and in view of the civil disputes prevailing between the family numbers of de-facto complainant, a false complaint is given by her.

The Additional Public Prosecutor prayed for dismissal of the application as the Police has already issued notice under Section 41-A CrPC to the petitioner/accused and he had not given any reply and that the investigation was still pending.

Finding of the Court

On perusal of the record, it was found that accused no. 2/petitioner no. 2 was not served with a notice under Section 41-A CrPC. Only the first accused was served with the notice.

The court observed that since the punishment prescribed for the offences alleged against the petitioners was up to seven years, the police were directed to issue notice under Section 41-A to accused no. 2.

The Criminal Petition was thus disposed of directing the Investigating Officer to strictly follow the procedure laid down under Section 41-A Cr.P.C. and the guidelines issued by the Hon'ble Apex Court in Arnesh Kumar v. State of Bihar, (2014) 8 SCC 273. The Investigating Officer was further directed not to arrest the petitioner till the completion of investigation and filing of final report.

Case Title : A. Kaluram v. The State of Telangana

Citation: 2022 LiveLaw (Tel) 44

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