NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has quashed criminal proceedings, against NGO members following a joint operation with labour department and police officers in 2014 to rescue child labourers from a brick kiln in Varanasi, after noting "malicious animus" and "personal vendetta" against them.
A bench of Justices P S Narasimha and Joymalya Bagchi also highlighted the inherent power of the High Court to prevent abuse of process of court is much wider in amplitude than the discharge powers and cannot be whittled down on the plea of existence of such remedy.
On a plea by Umashankar Yadav, a project coordinator with NGO 'Guria' and another person against the Allahabad High Court's order, declining to quash the proceedings, the court said, when faced with the agony of a lame prosecution, it is of little solace to a litigant to be told that inherent powers are shut out as he is entitled to approach the trial court and pray for discharge.
"Summoning of an accused is a serious matter which affects liberty and dignity of the individual concerned and judicial intervention under Section 482 CrPC to weed out vexatious proceedings is of pivotal importance in order to protect individuals from untelling harassment and misery and to ensure unmerited prosecutions do not crowd overflowing dockets of criminal courts and yield space for deserving cases," Justice Bagchi wrote in a 13-page judgment on May 8, 2025.
Allowing the appeal, the bench noted the High Court, in a perfunctory manner, observed the issues involved disputed questions of fact which could not be adjudicated before the court under Section 482 CrPC and the appellants have a right to seek discharge before the trial court.
The bench noted 'Guria' is a well known and reputed organisation fighting against human trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation of girls and children in the State of Uttar Pradesh. Due to its relentless efforts a number of minor girls have been rescued from the clutches of traffickers.
"While the pioneering efforts of the organization received accolades at national and international levels, its foot soldiers i.e. the appellants have suffered the ignominy of being branded as “criminals” for alleged overzealousness in course of a raid to rescue bonded labour/minor children from a brick kiln at Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh," the bench said.
Having considered the allegations in the charge sheet and statements of witnesses, the court noted the appellants had accompanied a team of Labour Enforcement Officers at the brick kiln, took away the workmen and children, though labour officers sought to record their statements at the site before taking further action.
The statements of labourers unequivocally showed that no force was used to take them away and they were promptly released. These statements do not give an impression that such action was with the intention to impede discharge of official duty, the bench said.
"There was a genuine difference of opinion between the appellants and the officials concerned. Members of the social organisation were of the impression that bonded labourers/children ought to be interrogated at a neutral place i.e. Police Station whereas the officers wanted to interrogate them at the site," the bench said.
The court found the requisite mens rea to obstruct official duty was absent in the case.
"When profile of the allegations emerging from the factual matrix of the case renders existence of mens rea patently absurd or inherently improbable, such prosecution is liable to be quashed as an abuse of process of law," the bench said.
The court emphasised that it was the duty of the High Court to ascertain whether the uncontroverted allegations in the FIR/ charge sheet constituted an offence, or continuation of the proceeding suffered from a legal bar or was wholly vexatious and an abuse of process of law.
In the case, the bench found the Additional Commissioner had gone to the extent of alleging the appellants had offered bribes to the labourers to make false statements.
"Such insinuations are wholly unfounded and not borne out from the statements recorded during investigation. This hostile stance of the department fortifies our conclusion that registration of the criminal case was a product of malice and personal vendetta against the appellants," the bench said.
The court also noted other insurmountable legal hurdles in the case as no prior permission of Magistrate was taken to register the FIR, rendering the registration of case and ensuing investigation as bad in law.
