22 February 2021 Corruption >> Criminal Law   |   FIR >> Criminal Law   |   Forgery >> Criminal Law  

The Allahabad High Court has quashed a criminal case involving charges of forgery and cheating after the accused and the complainant reached a settlement on the dispute.

Krishna Kumar Dubey, the accused in the case, was facing charges under sections 419, 420, 467, 468, and 471 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) related to forgery and cheating. The complainant, Rajendra Srivastava, had filed an FIR against Dubey in 2013.

Dubey approached the High Court seeking to quash the entire proceedings of the case under Section 482 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC). This provision allows the High Court to intervene in exceptional circumstances to prevent abuse of the legal process or to secure the ends of justice.

The court noted that an earlier attempt at settling the dispute through another application had failed. However, this time, both Dubey's lawyer and Srivastava's lawyer informed the court that a settlement had been reached.

Relying on previous Supreme Court judgements where quashing of cases based on settlements in non-compoundable offences was allowed, the High Court took into consideration the nature of the offences, which were financial/commercial in nature. The court also observed that continuing the case would serve no purpose since the dispute between the parties had been resolved. Consequently, the High Court allowed Dubey's application and quashed the entire proceedings of the criminal case.

  Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988    Indian Penal Code, 1860