Patna HC Quashes Cognizance Order Passed on Printed Proforma, Directs Fresh Reasoned Order
Patna High Court set aside a Magistrate's cognizance order filled in on a printed proforma, holding that taking cognizance without applying judicial mind is impermissible.
The Patna High Court has quashed a 2016 order by which the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate-IV, Katihar took cognizance of offences against a petitioner named Gauri Shankar Paswan Gautam Paswan in a food corporation case. Justice Chandra Shekhar Jha, sitting singly, held on 28 July 2026 that the cognizance order had been passed by filling in blanks on a printed proforma without any application of judicial mind. The court directed the trial court to pass a fresh order with reasons, if the matter is still pending before it. The judgment reinforces that summoning an accused in a criminal case is a serious judicial act, and even a brief cognizance order must show that the Magistrate actually applied his mind to the facts and the law.
The FIR and the Path to the Magistrate's Court
The case began on 9 April 2013 when Yadunandan Paswan, Assistant Godown Manager of the State Food Corporation at Kadwa, Katihar, filed a complaint before the Officer In-charge of Kadwa Police Station. On the basis of that complaint, the police registered Kadwa P.S. Case No. 70/2013 on 20 April 2013, recording offences under Sections 420, 406, 409 and 34 of the Indian Penal Code. The petitioner and others were named, and the police took up investigation.
After the police submitted a charge sheet, Sri Ranvijay Kumar, the A.C.J.M.-IV at Katihar, passed an order on 19 October 2016 taking cognizance of offences under Sections 420, 409 and 34 IPC. It was this cognizance order that the petitioner challenged before the High Court in Criminal Miscellaneous No. 4172 of 2019.
The Petitioner's Sole Challenge: A Proforma Order
Before Justice Jha, the petitioner's counsel Mr. Sarveshwar Tiwary did not press any argument going to the merits of the allegations. He confined his submission to a single, narrow point: the impugned order of 19 October 2016 was passed on a printed proforma, with blanks simply filled in, and disclosed no application of judicial mind. That, he submitted, made the order unsustainable in law.
The State was represented by Mr. Dilip Kumar No. 1, Additional Public Prosecutor. Opposite Party No. 2, though served with notice, did not appear.
Why Cognizance Cannot Be Taken Mechanically
Justice Jha reproduced the cognizance order in the judgment to place its deficiencies on record. He then set out the legal position on what taking cognizance actually requires.
Relying on Darshan Singh Ram Kishan v. State of Maharashtra, (1971) 2 SCC 654, the court recalled that cognizance takes place the moment a Magistrate first applies his mind to the suspected commission of an offence and takes judicial notice of it. Under Section 190 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, a Magistrate may take cognizance upon a complaint, upon a police report, or upon information received from a person other than a police officer. When cognizance is taken on a police report, the Magistrate takes notice of the offences disclosed in that report.
The court was clear that a Magistrate is not required to pass a detailed reasoned order at the stage of taking cognizance on a charge sheet. However, the absence of a detailed reasoning requirement is not a licence to fill in blanks on a printed form. Justice Jha stated that any judicial order, including a cognizance order, requires the application of judicial mind. Passing such an order in a mechanical manner, whether by filling blanks on a proforma or by affixing a ready-made seal on plain paper, reflects a lack of application of mind to the facts and is against settled judicial norms.
“Such tendency must be deprecated and cannot be allowed to perpetuate,” the court observed, adding that this practice must stop forthwith.
Justice Jha emphasised that summoning an accused in a criminal case is a serious matter. The cognizance order must show that the Magistrate applied his mind to the facts and to the applicable law, and that he satisfied himself as to which offences were prima facie made out against the accused on the basis of the allegations. The impugned order, passed by filling in a typed proforma without assigning any reason, met none of these requirements.
Outcome
The High Court allowed the petition. The cognizance order dated 19 October 2016 passed by the A.C.J.M.-IV, Katihar in Kadwa P.S. Case No. 70/2013 (G.R. No. 1054/13) was quashed and set aside. The trial court was directed to pass a fresh order, supplying reasons in accordance with law, if the matter is still pending before it. A copy of the judgment was directed to be sent to the trial court forthwith along with the trial court record, if any.