Cheque Dishonour - Concurrent Sentencing Rule Only When Cases Arise Out Of Single Transaction: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court observed that it is only when the conviction in a cheque case arise out of the single transaction, concurrent sentence would be merited.

But when there are several transactions, the judgment in V.K. Bansal v. State of Haryana (2013) 7 SCC 211 cannot be relied upon, the bench of Justices Hrishikesh Roy and Pankaj Mittal observed.

In this case, the petitioner (in Special Leave Petition) challenged consecutive sentences ordered for the four cases against her, under the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881. Citing V.K. Bansal case, it was contended that single transaction, the Court should have ordered for concurrent running of sentence instead of consecutive sentence, as has happened in this case.

In V K Bansal case, it was observed thus: "Each one of the loan transactions/financial arrangements was a separate and distinct transaction between the complainant on the one hand and the borrowing company/appellant on the other. If different cheques which are subsequently dishonoured on presentation, are issued by the borrowing company acting through the appellant, the same could be said to be arising out of a single loan transaction so as to justify a direction for concurrent running of the sentences awarded in relation to dishonour of cheques relevant to each such transaction. That being so, the substantive sentence awarded to the appellant in each case relevant to the transactions with each company referred to above ought to run concurrently."

The court noted that, in the instant case, there were several transactions over a period of time pertaining to supply of raw material to the petitioner for which the cheques tendered towards payment, were dishonoured.

"We have perused the ratio in the aforesaid judgment and find that only when the conviction arise out of the single transaction, concurrent sentence would be merited. But present are the cases where there were several transactions over a period of time pertaining to supply of raw material to the petitioner for which the cheques tendered towards payment, were dishonoured. Accordingly, we find that the petitioner can have no benefit out of the ratio in V.K. Bansal (supra).", the court observed while dismissing the SLP.

In this case the Petitioner (in Special Leave Petition) was represented by Advocate Anand Padmanabhan.R

Case details

K Padmaja Rani vs State of Telangana | 2023 LiveLaw (SC) 584 | SLP (Crl) 6742/2023

Headnotes

Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 ; Section 138 - Only when the conviction arise out of the single transaction, concurrent sentence would be merited - Where there were several transactions over a period of time  for which the cheques tendered towards payment, were dishonoured, convict cannot take benefit out of the ratio in V.K. Bansal v. State of Haryana (2013) 7 SCC 211.

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