Kerala High Court rejects UDF MLA Mani C Kappan's plea against framing of charges in cheating case

Kochi:In a setback to Congress-led UDF MLA Mani C Kappan, the Kerala High Court on Wednesday dismissed his plea against a special court order framing charges against him for the offences of cheating and criminal breach of trust.

Justice C S Dias said that based on the facts, submissions made before him, materials on record and the applicable legal provisions, there was no "illegality, impropriety or irregularity" in the special court's order.

"The revision petition is devoid of any merits and is only liable to be dismissed in limine. Resultantly, the revision petition is dismissed," the High Court said.

Kappan, in his revision plea, had claimed that the special court did not apply its mind before framing the charges against him as it did not give any reasons in its order.

He had also claimed that he may be granted an opportunity to file an application for discharge because he was not given such an opportunity by the special court.

The High Court said that Kappan had initially challenged the proceedings in the special court and his plea was dismissed by the High Court and later the Supreme Court.

Subsequently, the complainant's witnesses were examined, but Kappan did not cross examine them, the High Court noted.

"Yet, the petitioner (Kappan) did not file any application for discharge," the High Court said, rejecting his claims.

"A reading of the impugned order would show that the Magistrate has applied his mind and arrived at a conclusion that there are grounds to presume that the accused has committed the above offences.

"Accordingly, the court below deemed it fit to frame charges against the revision petitioner (Kappan)," the High Court added.

The allegation against Kappan is that he had borrowed Rs 2 crore from the complainant in 2010, but only repaid Rs 25 lakh.

Subsequently, he entered into an agreement with the complainant in 2013 as per which Kappan agreed to repay Rs 3.25 crore to the complainant in instalments.

Kappan issued post dated cheques towards the repayment and also created a charge over his property having an extent of 40.15 acres of land in favour of the complainant.

However, the cheques got dishonoured and the complainant learnt that the property was already offered as security in favour of the Kottayam Co-operative Agricultural and Rural Development Bank.

Following this, the complainant filed a cheating case against Kappan.