IN THE ANDHRA PRADESH HIGH COURT 

Tamada Gopala Krishna for the petitioner. 

P. Srinivas Reddy for respondent No. 1. 

Public Prosecutor for respondent No. 2. 

JUDGMENT 

VAMAN RAO J. - This petition under section 482 of the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973, has been filed by the sixth accused in C.C. No. 218 of 1997, on the file of the VIth Metropolitan Magistrate for Railways, Visakhapatnam, for quashing the proceedings in the said case. 

Respondent No. 1, a company wholly owned by the Government of India, is the complainant in this case. There were some transactions between the complainant and A-1 company (Raghunath Cotton and Oil Products) as commission agent. Certain amounts were found due from accused No.1-company to the complainant and subject to final settlement the accused agreed to pay Rs. 135 lakhs and issued a cheque dated November 6, 1994, for Rs. 65,00,000 drawn on the State Bank of India, Ongole branch on the account of accused No. 1-company. Another cheque dated November 29, 1994, for Rs. 70 lakhs drawn, on the same bank on the same account was also issued under the signature of the managing director of the company who is the second accused in that C.C. The complainant presented the cheques for collection in their bank, namely, the State Bank of India, Ongole, on November 22, 1994. The cheques were returned on the ground that sufficient funds are not available in the accounts
concerned. 

It is stated that these facts were brought to the notice of accused Nos. 2 to 7 who are in charge of the affairs of the company relating to the transactions under reference. The accused requested the complainant to represent the cheques with a promise that enough funds would be available in the account to honour the cheques. The complainant re-presented one of the cheques in State Bank of India, Overseas Branch, Visakhapatnam, on December 1, 1994. The said cheque was sent for collection by the said bank to the State Bank of India, Ongole branch on which the cheque was drawn. The said bank dishonoured the cheque and transmitted the same along with memo dated December 9, 1994, mentioning the reasons for dishonour as "exceeds arrangement's. The complainant received this intimation on December 22, 1994. The complainant got issued a lawyer's notice dated December 23, 1994, setting out the above facts and required A-1 and A-2 to make the payments within 15 days from the date of service, of notice. Accused Nos. 1 and 2 received notice but did not choose to make any payments within the period of 15 days. On the other hand, the complainant received a contentious reply with false allegations. Hence, the complaint for the offence under section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act was filed with liberty to take such a civil and other criminal actions as are warranted. Thus, it would be seen that the complaint is in respect of dishonour of cheque of Rs. 65,00,000. 

Learned counsel for the petitioner, Sri Tamada Gopala Krishna seeks quashing of these proceedings on various grounds. 

Firstly, it is contended that the petitioner herein is accused No. 6 in the complaint and admittedly notice as required under
section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act was issued to the company and its managing director, i.e., accused Nos. 1 and 2, respectively, and no notice was issued separately to the petitioner herein and as such requirement under section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act has not been complied with. 

Learned counsel for the respondent, Sri P. Srinivas Reddy, contends that the petitioner herein, accused No. 6 is being sought to be made liable for the offence under section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act in view of the provisions in section 141 of the Negotiable Instruments Act inasmuch as he as an officer of the company was in charge of and was responsible for the conduct of the business of the company. This contention on behalf of learned counsel for the petitioner is based on section 138 (b) of the Negotiable Instruments Act which reads as follows : 

"(b) the payee or the holder in due course of the cheque, as the case may be, makes a demand for the payment of the said amount of money of giving a notice, in writing, to the drawer of the cheque, within 15 days of the receipt of information by him from the bank regarding the return of the cheque as unpaid." 

This provision mandates that a notice has to be given by the payee under a cheque which has been dishonoured to the drawer of the cheque. In this case, as the cheque has been drawn on behalf of the company under the signature of its managing director, A-21 the requirement under section 138 (b) of the Negotiable Instruments Act shall be deemed to have been complied with if notice is given to the company and represented by its managing director. 

Section 141 of the Negotiable Instruments Act provides that if the person committing an offence under section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act is a company, then not only the company will be liable but every person who, at the time the offence was committed, was in charge of, and was responsible to, the company for the conduct of the business of the company shall be deemed to be guilty of the offence. 

Reading together the provisions in section 138, and section 141 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, it would be clear that while section 141 of the Negotiable Instruments Act creates the basis for liability against the employees of the company if the requirements under the said section are satisfied, there is no contemplation of notice to be issued in respect of such employees whose liability is based on section 141 of the Negotiable Instruments Act. As observed above, the requirement of section 138 (b) of the Act is that notice should be sent to the drawer of the cheque and not to all the persons who can be deemed to be liable apart from the drawer of the cheque by virtue of the provision in section 141 of the Act. 

Thus, in this case, the contention that the prosecution of the petitioner, A-6, is bad for want of notice to him separately cannot be countenanced. 

The next ground on which the proceedings are sought to be quashed is that admittedly the petitioner is only a commercial manager of accused No. 1-company and he is not even a director of the said company. 

According to learned counsel, the commercial manager may be assigned some duties which may be considered very important and may take active part in the trading transactions of the company. But that itself will not be sufficient to mulct him with criminal liability under section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act. 

Learned counsel for the respondent on the other hand contends that the complaint has laid sufficient basis for rendering the petitioner liable for the offence attributable to the company in view of section 141 of the Act. Section 141 of the Act contemplates that if a person committing an offence under section 138 of the Act is a company then not only the said company is liable but every person who at the time offence was committed "was in charge of, and was responsible to, the conduct of the business of the company" shall be deemed to be guilty of the offence and can be proceeded against and punished accordingly. 

In this case, in para. 4 of the complaint, there is a specific averment in this regard as follows : 

"When the facts were brought to the notice of accused Nos. 2 to 7 who are in charge of the affairs of the accused company relating to the transaction under reference, they requested the complainant to represent . . ." 

Again, in para. 6 of the complaint, the following assertion is found : 

"The second accused being the managing director and signatory of the cheque and the fifth accused (sixth accused ?) as commercial manager who requested time with a promise to make the funds available and accused Nos. 3 to 5 being the other directors in charge of the day-to-day affairs are responsible to see that the cheque is duly honoured when presented by the complainant." 

Learned counsel for the petitioner points out that in the averment referred to above in para. 6, the statement as to being in charge of the day-to-day affairs is referable to only accused Nos. 3 to 5 who are the directors but not to accused No. 5 (accused No. 6 ?) who has been shown as the commercial manager. 

It is debatable whether the reference in question is only to accused Nos. 3 to 5 and it also includes accused No. 5 (accused No. 6) shown as commercial manager. In a petition under section 482 of the Criminal Procedure Code for quashing the proceedings a minute dissection as to the meaning of a particular statement in the complaint cannot be undertaken and if two interpretations are possible, the criminal proceedings cannot be quashed on the basis of one such interpretation. The question as to which of the interpretations is more possible has to be left to the trial court to be decided in the light of other circumstances and facts brought on record during the trial. At any rate, in para. 4 of the complaint referred to above, there is a specific mention that accused Nos. 2 to 7 are in charge of the affairs of the accused-company. 

Thus, there is no scope for arguments based on the contents of the complaint that the allegations do not satisfy the requirements of section 141 of the Negotiable Instruments Act. When there is a specific assertion that a particular accused along with others was in charge of the affairs of the company, the mere fact that the exact words of section 141 of the Act to the effect "was in charge of, and was responsible to, the company for the conduct of the business of the company" are not reproduced in the complaint does not justify the quashing of the proceedings. At any rate, in this case there is not only an assertion that the petitioner as a commercial manager was in charge of the affairs of the company, there is further elaboration in regard to his role in as much as it is stated that it was the petitioner who requested time for payment, with a promise to make the funds available. 

As observed by the Supreme Court in the case of Rajesh Bajaj v. State NCT of Delhi, AIR 1999 SC 1216, in a petition under section 482 of the Criminal Procedure Code, it is not permissible to adopt a strictly hyper-technical approach and "sieve the complaint through a colander of finest gauzes for testing the ingredients" of the offence alleged against the accused. As to whether the person in question was really in charge of the affairs of the company and was responsible for the affairs of the company or not, and as to what functions he was assigned in the affairs of the company and whether those functions could be considered sufficient to hold that he was in charge of the affairs of the company are matters which have to be gone into during the trial. The trial court will come to its own conclusion on this aspect and the observations in this order shall not be related as findings of fact. 

In the result, the criteria laid down by the Supreme Court in the case of State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal [1992] Suppl. 1 SCC 335 cannot be said to have been satisfied in this case. 

In the result, this petition is dismissed. 

However, it is open to the petitioner to move the trial court for dispensing with his personal attendance inasmuch as it is now stated that he has left the company and has accepted a job in some other place and there is no reason for the trial court for not considering such a request subject to the requirement that he is represented by someone and subject to the requirement of his presence on the specific dates of hearing as directed by the trial court.