The Supreme Court has set aside a Bombay High Court order dismissing a Petition seeking quashing of an FIR while observing that there was a violation of the principles of natural justice as no reason was mentioned as to why the High Court was not inclined to even issue notice to the litigants.

The Supreme Court was considering a criminal appeal challenging the order of the Division Bench of the Aurangabad Bench of the Bombay High Court.

The Division Bench of Justice B.V. Nagarathna and Justice Satish Chandra Sharma said, “In the absence of any of the aforesaid options being exercised by the Division Bench of the High Court, we find that the impugned order is in violation of the principles of natural justice inasmuch as we are not able to gather any reason as to why the High Court was not inclined to even issue notice to respondent(s) in the application filed by the appellant(s) herein seeking quashing of the FIR registered against the appellant(s).”

Advocate Mahesh Prakash Shinde represented the Appellants while Advocate Varad Kilor represented the Respondents.

Factual Background

The appellants had filed a criminal application seeking the quashing of the complaint filed against them. It was alleged that there was a civil dispute between the parties, but a criminal color was given to it by the lodging of the FIR.

Arguments

It was the case of the appellants that there had been no consideration of the case of the appellants by the Division Bench of the High Court. The High Court was not even inclined to issue notice to the respondents in the application filed by the appellants. It was also submitted that there was no reason whatsoever for dismissing the complaint, let alone declining to even issue notice.

Reasoning

On a perusal of the impugned order, the Bench noted that if the Division Bench of the High Court was not inclined to even issue notice to the respondents, then reasons ought to have been assigned for that purpose, or in the alternative, notice should have been issued to the respondents. As per the Bench, only after giving a fair opportunity to both sides, the complaint should not have been dismissed on merits.

The Bench was also unable to gather any reason as to why the High Court was not inclined to even issue notice to respondents in the application filed by the appellants.

Thus, setting aside the impugned order and remanding the matter to the High Court, the Bench allowed the appeal.

Cause Title: Gopal Govind Lakade & Anr. v. The State of Maharashtra & Anr. (Neutral Citation: 2025 INSC 658)

Appearance:

Appellants: Advocates Mahesh Prakash Shinde, AOR Ashok Kumar Gupta II

Respondents: Advocates Varad Kilor, Siddharth Dharmadhikari, AOR Aaditya Aniruddha Pande

Click here to read/download Order


Justice BV NagarathnaJustice Satish Chandra Sharma

Tulip Kanth

Assistant Editor

Tulip Kanth is an Assistant Editor at Verdictum having over 5 years of experience in the field of legal journalism and editing. She extensively covers judgments of the Supreme Court, High Courts as well as Tribunals. She has previously worked with a legal publishing website where she oversaw the work of other editors and has also created updates on notifications of different Government Ministries. She holds an English Honours Degree from SGTB Khalsa College, Delhi University and has completed her LLB course with specialisation in Corporate Law from Amity University.