Anuja Prabhudessai JUDGMENT
R.V. More, J.
1. The Applicant in Criminal Application No. 198 of 2015 is the original complainant. The Applicants in other applications claim that they also are the victims of the fraud committed by the Petitioner and therefore interested in the outcome of this petition. We therefore thought it fit to grant them a right of audience in the matter and accordingly they were heard in the matter.
2. Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith. By consent of the learned Senior Counsel and Counsel appearing for the respective parties, petition is taken up for final hearing.
3. Heard the learned Senior Counsel appearing for the Petitioner, the learned Advocate General for the State and the learned Counsel appearing for the Intervenors.
4. By this writ petition filed under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India read with section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, the Petitioner is seeking to quash the invocation of sections 3 and 4 of the MPID Act qua the Petitioner in relation to CR. No. 89 of 2013 registered with EoW, Unit-V, which is now numbered as Case No. 1 of 2014 before the Special Designated Court after filing of charge-sheet. For the sake of brevity, the Maharashtra Protection of Interest of Depositors (In Financial Establishments) Act, 1999 is referred to as "the MPID Act".
5. The Petitioner-NSEL is a company registered under the Companies Act, 1956. It provides electronic platform for spot trading in various commodities and operates from 16 cities across the country. The Petitioner-Exchange is permitted trading in commodities by and through its registered brokers/ trading members and such trading covered 52 specified commodities. The Petitioner started its full-fledged operations in the month of October 2008. They launched their first trader contract "Silver/Gold in intra trading" in Kolkatta. Thereafter they launched different types of contracts like farmer contract, paired contract and E-series contract. The T+2 and T+25 days contrasts are together called paired contracts. The first trader paired contract was launched on 22nd September 2009.
The functioning at the Petitioner's platform was that the Seller of the commodity was required to deposit his stocks, which were to be traded on the Petitioner's platform, in the ware-houses which were designated or owned by the Petitioner on or before "T" day [i.e., Trade Day]. The Petitioner was responsible for checking and verifying the quality and quantity of the commodities. After the Petitioner verifies the quality and quantify of such commodity, ware-house receipt is issued which was proof of ownership of commodity deposited in the ware-house. The depositor was supposed to receive photo / scanned copy of the ware-house receipt and the original was to be retained by the Petitioner-Exchange to transfer the same to the prospective buyer. On T-day, the investors would enter into a contract to buy the commodity with T+2 delivery cycle. Simultaneously, he would also enter into a contact to sell the commodities with a T+25 delivery cycle. On T+2, the Petitioner would issue a delivery allocation report in which the quantity and location of the commodities purchased would be mentioned. The allocation report contained details of the end client, war........