Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh): The Allahabad High Court on Friday stated that non-cognisable offences cannot be investigated by police without permission of Magistrate.
Justice Shamim Ahmed was hearing an application filed to reject as invalid the charge proceedings in a case registered under Sections 171 H (Illegal payments in connection with an election) and 188 (disobedience causes or tends to cause danger to human life) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The court has made it clear that a case cannot be filed against the candidate under section 171H of IPC and that the said section can be imposed only on a person other than the candidate.
Advocate Chandan Srivastava, on behalf of the petitioner, Rashid Khan argued that the Khan contested in the local body elections, 2017 from the Sardar Bhagat Singh Ward of Ayodhya. During the elections, an FIR was lodged by the local police station in-charge on the allegation that his poster was put on an electric pole.
Following an investigation, a charge sheet was filed against Khan under sections 171H and 188 of IPC. Thereafter, taking cognisance of the charge sheet, the lower court summoned Khan and it was argued that Section 195(1) of CrPC (A criminal conspiracy to commit an offence cannot be brought before a court unless the public servant involved or another public servant to whom he is administratively subordinate files a written complaint) provides that cognisance can be taken only on a complaint under Section 188, whereas Section 171H is of non-cognisable nature which cannot be imposed on any election candidate.
The High Court noted that the FIR and charge sheet do not reveal any offense that the applicant is guilty of, which would enable the police to concurrently investigate and file the charge sheet for both cognisable and non-cognisable offenses.
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