The Supreme Court of India has drawn a firm line around the limits of inherent powers, making it clear that cheque dishonour prosecutions cannot be smothered at birth by speculative fact-finding.
Setting aside an order of the Patna High Court, the Court held that High Courts cannot quash proceedings under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure by conducting a pre-trial probe into whether a cheque was issued towards a legally enforceable debt or liability.
The bench underscored a simple but often overlooked principle: once a complaint discloses the basic ingredients of a cheque bounce offence, the case must move forward. At that stage, courts are not meant to weigh evidence or test defences. Those questions belong to the trial.
Crucially, the Court pointed to the statutory presumption under Section 139 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881, which operates in favour of the complainant. That presumption, the Court said, cannot be wished away through a “roving enquiry” at the threshold. It may be rebutted—but only by evidence, and only during trial.
The High Court’s mistake lay in trying to answer, too early, the very question that the law reserves for adjudication: whether the cheque was issued to discharge a debt or liability. By doing so, it crossed the boundary between screening frivolous cases and prematurely deciding contested facts.
Reiterating settled law, the Supreme Court emphasized that quashing jurisdiction is narrow. If the complaint and supporting material make out a prima facie case, courts must resist the temptation to short-circuit the process by evaluating credibility or sufficiency of evidence before it is led.
With that, the appeal was allowed. The cheque dishonour complaint has been restored to the file of the trial court, to proceed in accordance with law—where defences can be tested, presumptions rebutted, and facts finally settled.
