Hridaya Ranjan Prasad Verma v. State of Bihar

2000 (2) SCR 859

Court: Supreme Court of India (Criminal Appellate Jurisdiction)
Case: Criminal Appeal Nos. 313-314 of 2000
Decided: 31 March 2000
Bench: K.T. Thomas, D.P. Mohapatra (judgment by D.P. Mohapatra, J.)
Citation: 2000 (2) SCR 859
Provisions: Indian Penal Code, 1860, s. 415 (cheating) and s. 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) (now Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, s. 318(1) and s. 318(4))

Headnote

Cheating · IPC s. 415 and s. 420 (BNS s. 318) · Breach of contract and cheating distinguished · Dishonest intention at the time of the promise · Quashing of complaint, CrPC s. 482

The case, in the Court's words

On a reading of the complaint portions of which have been extracted earlier it is clear that the main offence alleged to have been committed by the appellants is 'cheating' punishable under section 420 IPC. [PDF p. 4]

Held

On a reading of the section it is manifest that in the definition there are set forth two separate classes of acts which the person deceived may be induced to do. [...] In the first class of cases the inducing must be fraudulent or dishonest. In the second class of acts, the inducing must be intentional but not fraudulent or dishonest. [PDF p. 5]
In determining the question it has to be kept in mind that the distinction between mere breach of contract and the offence of cheating is a fine one. It depends upon the intention of the accused at the time [...] inducement which may be judged by his subsequent conduct but for this subsequent conduct is not the sole test. [PDF p. 5]
Mere breach of contract cannot give rise to criminal prosecution for cheating unless fraudulent or dishonest intention is shown right at the beginning of the transaction, that is the time when the offence is said to have been committed. Therefore it is the intention which is the gist of the offence. [PDF p. 5]
To hold a person guilty of cheating it is necessary to show that he had fraudulent or dishonest intention at the time of making the promise. From his mere failure to keep up promise subsequently such a culpable intention right at the beginning, that is, when he made the promise cannot be presumed. [PDF p. 5]
Therefore the core postulate of dishonest intention in order to deceive the complainant-respondent no.2 is not made out even accepting all the [...] averments in the complaint on their face value. [PDF p. 5]

Result

Accordingly the appeals are allowed. The Judgment/Order dated 13-4-1999 of the Patna High Court [...] is set aside and the proceeding in Criminal Case No. 22/96 pending in the Court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Siwan is quashed. [PDF p. 6]

Editorial note: subsequent treatment

The passage on breach of contract and cheating is quoted in Indian Oil Corporation v. NEPC India Ltd. (2006) and in M.N.G. Bharateesh Reddy v. Ramesh Ranganathan (2022), and is cited in Satishchandra Ratanlal Shah v. State of Gujarat (2019), Manish v. State of Maharashtra (2025) and Jupally Lakshmikantha Reddy v. State of A.P. (2025). The official copy prints no paragraph numbers, so the references are to pages of the official PDF.

The headnote consists of extracts from the Court's judgment, selected by The Daily Bench for convenience. The selection is not part of the judgment, is not a law report and should not be cited. It may contain errors; rely on the official judgment. Library reference TDB-LL BNS-318/06 is our own cataloguing label and is not a citation.