Debangana Ray
Published on June 14 at 19:10 IST
The Karnataka High Court recently stated that under Section 147 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, all offences are compoundable. Hence, there is no restriction on the parties to compound the offence.
The accused had approached before the High Court, after his conviction for the offence punishable under Section 138 of the NI Act was confirmed by the Fast Track Court in the criminal appeals.
The judgement regarding the conviction and sentence was passed by the Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Bangalore.
After inquiring both the parties, the Court said that, “Both parties have, with their free consent and out of their own volition, without being influenced by undue influence, duress or misrepresentation or by mistake, have entered into the terms of settlement in their best interest. Hence, there is no embargo to deny them the permission to settle the matter.”
The Apex court relied on the judgement of Damodar S. Prabhu v. Sayed Babalal H, where it was mentioned that if the application for compounding is filed before the High court or sessions court in revision or appeal, such compounding is permitted.
However, the accused has to pay 15 percent of the cheque amount by way of cost.
Accordingly, it allowed the joint application and said, “The parties to the present petitions are permitted to compound the offence, however, subject to the petitioner herein (accused) paying a total sum of ₹81,000/- towards graded cost, in this Court, within fifteen days from today.“
Thus, the accused was acquitted and the judgements of the conviction were set aside.