Victim in cheque bounce case entitled to appeal acquittal directly: HC

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has clarified that a court’s ruling explaining an important point of law is not treated as new law, but as clarifying what the law has always meant since its inception. As such, the rulings apply to all cases, including those already pending before the courts.

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Justice Sumeet Goel asserted that judges do not create new laws. Their role is to uncover and articulate the true meaning of laws already in place. A judicial declaration recognises a truth that has always existed, rather than inventing something new. The ruling came as the court clarified further that a victim in a cheque bounce case was entitled to appeal acquittal directly without seeking leave to appeal.

Justice Goel added that judicial decisions laying down key legal principles extend their effect to all matters, regardless of the stage of proceedings. “The judiciary’s role is not to pronounce a new law but to maintain and expound the old one,” the court remarked, while emphasising that judges act as interpreters, not lawmakers.

The observations came while dealing with a victim’s application for grant of special leave to appeal against the acquittal of an accused in a cheque bounce case. The victim was seeking the setting aside of judgment dated March 5 passed by a Judicial Magistrate acquitting the respondent-accused of charges under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments (NI) Act.

Justice Goel held that it was “irrefutably established” by the authoritative pronouncement of the Supreme Court in the case of 'Celestium Financial' that an appeal against an acquittal in a proceeding under Section 138 of the NI Act, when preferred by the complainant, fell squarely within the scope of Section 372 of the CrPC.

Justice Goel added a complainant in a cheque bounce case “unquestionably satisfies the statutory definition of a ‘victim’ as contemplated under the CrPC, thereby vesting in the complainant the unequivocal right to prefer an appeal under Section 372 of the CrPC".

Consequently, he ruled that the appeal, having been filed under Section 378 of the CrPC — which provides the State with the right to appeal acquittals — along with an application for leave to appeal was “fundamentally unsustainable and not maintainable in its current procedural posture” in light of the Celestium Financial decision.

Justice Goel rejected the argument that Celestium Financial would not apply because the events in question predated the ruling. The court observed that while laws passed by the legislature usually applied prospectively unless stated otherwise, judicial decisions operated retrospectively unless expressly limited.