This is Keena Nicely with the life of the land is in its real estate, and I am an agent at Heller Williams, but today we have a special guest. We have Vince Gevings from Tri-City Equity here to talk about multi-family investing. Hi Vince, thanks for joining us today. Hey Keena, how are you? Thanks for having me. Hey, so tell us a little bit about yourself. Okay, yeah, so I'm active duty Air Force. I've been in for 14 years, a little 14 years. Been investing in real estate for about four years, going to my fifth year of investing. I started investing in multi-family only about three years ago. So I'm fairly new, but fairly experienced. It's been quite of a rollercoaster the last three years and lots of scale, lots of growth. And we're looking for a great 2021 going forward and lots of things happening in the market with our company and our other groups as well. So great. So what is it exactly that you do? So in Tri-City Equity Group in that capacity, I wear a couple of different hats. One of the ones is the acquisition director. So I go out and develop relationships with brokers, do a lot of market research, figure out what markets we're going to go into, why we're going to go into them, what's the job growth, population growth, income growth, crime rates, things like that for all the markets we identify and then engage brokers in that market, owners in that market of assets that we'd like to acquire that are buying criteria. And then that's the acquisition side. Then from there, I go into due diligence. I run a lot of the due diligence of negotiating inspections, dealing with contractors, building up business plans, performance, engaging with lenders on getting the right kind of lending and debt on these assets. Then once we close, I change seats and put a different hat on, which is the asset manager. And that's where I really thrive. That's my favorite role is being an asset manager. Currently, our portfolio is 290 units, roughly around $14, $15 million assets under management. We close on another property here in about two and a half weeks. We'll add another 50 or so units to that portfolio. And we have a pipeline full of at least two more deals coming down that we're under contract in as well. Wow. So this last year, the real estate market's been quite crazy along with the COVID-19. So what have you seen? Has anything changed in the last year? Has it been harder to get properties? How has that been working for you? Oh, man, it's been a roller coaster. So let's go back to April of 2020. That's when everything kind of hit the fan, so to speak. So April 2020, actually, this time last year, we were under contract on a 48 unit property in one of our target markets, which is El Paso, Texas. Everything was going smooth and March hit and everything went crazy. We ended up negotiating that deal because we were almost pulled out of that deal because the world was ending March 2020. And we ended up renegotiating that deal with the sellers and getting ourselves in a really good cash position by getting a seller credit. So we had enough cash on hand that we felt very comfortable in going through any kind of storm that's going to come. We had enough cash to make it a whole year without any income. So I was like, we're pretty good on that one. So we chose to move forward on that deal. So the lending got a lot tighter at the last minute. We're talking 11th hour. The lender came back and they said they wanted a $75,000, which is equivalent to about one year of interest reserves on that property, at closing to go escrowed. So we had to come up with another 75 grand. So the lending was getting tighter. The seller was getting pretty stressed out of, they felt like they were holding a time bomb at the world ending and everything like that. So we ended up staying calm, cool, collected, sticking to our business plans, sticking to our criteria, getting really conservative on our underwriting and saying, okay, what's the worst case scenario that could happen? Plan for that. We came up with a solution. We executed it. We ended up closing that deal. And it's that deal actually turned into a homerun for us looking at, you know, crossing one year later. Since then, we've closed three more deals all through COVID and all different business plans, different scenarios, different markets. One of them was in Michigan. One of them was in Virginia. One of them was in, another one of them was in El Paso, Texas. And it's been, it's been crazy.  So the best thing to be is agile, flexible, stay true to your underwriting is another thing that you do a, you do, you build a pro-form, which is like a business plan, your financial analysis. Be very conservative on it. Meaning don't, don't plan on, you know, raising rents because we're talking rental properties here, raising rents, you know, the whole bunch of money, like 10%, 20%, keep it very minimal the first couple of years because we don't know what's going to happen if the deal still works. Then you can, you can move forward in that deal pretty confident that you're not going to end up losing a whole lot on it. So what are you seeing since you are dealing with rentals with this rental moratorium? Do you, are you guys being impacted by that at all? It depends. So one thing, and I'm pretty good at market research. It's again, one of the hats I wears as director of acquisition. And one thing I never really paid too much of attention to was the, like, the governor's stances on things, the state governor. It's always been not really, we always look at like landlord tenant laws, like those things are important. You want to know what you're getting into and play out different scenarios that could happen. Understanding the governor's politics has never really been on my radar. It is now because I have the benefit of comparing different, different parts of our portfolio. So we have a Virginia portfolio, Michigan portfolio, Texas portfolio. And they are apples to oranges, how they, how they performed over the last 12 months couldn't be more different. The Michigan one has been impacted heavily on, on that for COVID, the moratorium, our rent collections, things like that. I believe a lot of it, in my opinion, has to do with the policy that was put into place and how the local governments and the state governments handled that. Texas, on the other hand, completely different. We had the best year ever. Very little rents, past due balances and bad debt. A lot of our tenants communicated a lot better on that property when we had to go and get some relief for tenants that were affected and residents that were affected and laid off. The state was a lot more responsive in getting the residents the help that they needed there. And again, they also had the federal moratorium, just like everybody else did. It was just how it was executed and handled. It's completely different. So moving forward, the lesson there is pay attention a little bit more to who the mayor is, look at maybe their background, who the governor is, look at their background. Because again, a lot of real estate investors, that wouldn't, it would never be on the radar to think of those things. Now, now I look at those things. Yeah, yeah, that's not something I would have even thought of with investing or real estate is the politics of the area. So how do you, you're in different different markets. How do you choose a market? So how did you choose to be in Texas and Michigan? And how do you choose the market to be in? Yeah, great question. So one of the things, I know, and we're going to get to this, how am I doing this from Hawaii? One of the answers for that is a lot of people say being in Hawaii or out of state, you're looking at out of state investing, it's very a daunting task. But if you switch it to, as with the benefit that is I can go anywhere, but if I choose to go out of state, literally, I can go to any state, I can go all 50 states where if you're state side, on the mainland, a lot of people are like, well, I need to find something in my backyard. And they're very, kind of, they're looking at only like maybe a two or three hour radius. But once you're here and you make the decision, well, there's nothing here in Hawaii that's going to work for my, my business plan and my goals. So I'm going to go mainland. Once you make that decision, that mental decision, you can go anywhere. So the entire country's up for grabs. So it's pretty rewarding to be able to look at all these different markets. So one of the, the main criteria is I would look for, like I mentioned earlier, our population growth, job growth and income growth. All three of those need to be, you know, trending upwards over the last few years, you can do look at census data. There's a bunch of resources out there to track that kind of information. All of it's free.  Then I look at things like crime rates, make sure that those are trending down or consistently low. And then I look at things like proximity to major interstate systems, major airports, because you want to find places where transportation is good, because that'll lead to good manufacturing, good people, good for business travel and things like that. So you want to see the airport is within, you know, 30, 40 miles is a pretty decent size airport. It's a good metric. A lot of people do rail systems with some kind of rail hubs of transportation for manufacturing. Look for those things that drive economic growth. Or one of the other, as we start getting down to the weeds of what I look for. But those are the biggest ones, job growth, population growth, income growth. Once I get through all just the numbers, the boring side of it, or unless you're analytical in the very fun side of data analysis. Then I look for things, okay, what do I have a competitive advantage in these markets? The reason I'm in Michigan, that's a very odd market to be in, is because I had a competitive advantage in there. My wife is from Michigan, her whole family's from Michigan for generations. Even though I've never lived in Michigan, that was a competitive advantage to me when I was starting to get into real estate investing, because I could call up my mother-in-law or my brother-in-law and be like, I found this property on the MLS, it's a four-unit apartment complex. It's going to be a great property. Can you go do a drive-by? Let me know what you think, or maybe go meet the agent out there. So I can get a different perspective. I'm not just going to agent's testimony of what this property is. I can get somebody I trust. So that was my competitive advantage. Not saying that agents cannot trust worthy, but you know what I mean. So different perspective. That was my competitive advantage. I bought my first 20 units like that, where I've never actually seen them before I bought them. It was all going to a market, adding a competitive advantage in. I sent a couple people to the property that I trust. They all kind of give me their story, their testimony on what that property is. I kind of put all together on my end back here and got a pretty good picture of what the property was going to be and executed on it, bought the property and they were great for me while I had them. Wow. So you don't always keep every investment that you buy. Can you go into that a little bit more? Yes. So going back to those properties. So I started investing, I guess we go back to the beginning. So I started investing real estate in 2016, I guess is when I officially would call myself an investor. I did what's called the house hack. So I lived in a house. I kind of flipped it while I lived in it and then I sold it tax-free because of the whole two-year rule there. So I took that capital and I was like, I want to buy more real estate. That's when I got into more education was like I need to learn more about this and find websites like bigger pockets, online forums, go to local meetups and start figuring out these strategies. At the time, 2016, bigger pockets was starting to become really big. There's a great resource. It's also 99% free. So definitely a good place to start your journey without spending a whole lot of money.  So my start was getting like duplexes and foreplexes. That's what I knew those residential properties. I was like, okay, I'm going to get as much of these as I can. So I took that capital from that living flip. It was about $130,000. It was Bay Area, California, 2016-17. So kind of like here, you can just buy a property set up for a couple years and make a pretty good amount. So that's essentially what happened. Took that and I bought the first 20 units. It was I think six properties, some duplexes, some foreplexes, equaled up to 20 units. And then I started finding the limitations of that strategy.  And some of those limitations are your debt-to-income ratio that most people don't think about. So every time you get a loan, you're getting a conventional loan because it's a residential property. So you can get these good conventional loans, 30-year amps. They sound great until you start stacking them up. And then you go to the bank and they're like, you're at 70% DTI. We're not lending to you anymore. And I was like, well, okay, well, I need to solve this problem. And because you're buying them in your personal name, even if you quick claim them into an LLC, the mortgage is still on your name because you got the conventional loan. So your debt-to-income ratio goes up. That's one of the limiting factors of trying to scale with the small properties. So I was like, okay, I'll refinance them into my business name. The problem with that came, the limiting factor. And it was kind of another aha moment was residential properties are valued off of the comp value, the comparable value approach. So even though I bought these properties, did a bunch of work to them, these duplexes and fourplexes, when I went to go get the appraisal done, the appraisal came back at the exact price or a little bit over the price I bought it for. And I was like, I did all this work to it. And they're like, that's great. But it's still a comp property. And the only comp is that duplex across the street. And that one's worth 170. So yours is worth 170. I was like, well, I paid 170. They're like, what do you want me to do? So that was the other aha moment for me of the residential properties, those sub five-unit properties, are not really the best for scaling a real estate investment company. That's what your goal is. And we can talk about goal setting and clarity too. But if your goal is to scale a good size portfolio to replace, say your W2 income, I probably wouldn't do it with duplexes and quads or single families because you're going to run to those issues where you're going to run out of conventional loans, your debt to income is going to increase to where it's going to ruin your personal credibility or credit. And then you're stuck with the comp value approach as well. So that's when I made the decision. That was my last aha moment. And I was like, I got to do large multifamily. So back into the books, back into education, join some groups, figured out the whole multifamily thing. And it's been off to the races since then. That was 2018. So 2018 went from 20 units to 290 units is what my portfolio is now. And it's about to double again by Q2 this year. So it's like kind of solving the Rubik's Cube. We figured it out, built the systems, built the processes, developed those relationships. And now it's just rinse and repeat, kind of like the first strategy. So let's step back a minute. And you talked about you're here in Hawaii, but you're doing it on the mainland. So why is it that you haven't invested in the multifamily's multiple doors here in the islands? Great question. So I tried looking and was quickly realized that the return on the properties here didn't meet my goals. So when we're talking about things like cap rate, and I know it's where you're going to go with that. So the cap rates here are very compressed is the terminology that we use the jargon. So we're talking two to 3% capitalization rates, which is the easiest way to understand that is your cap rate is your rate of return if you paid 100% cash. So if you went to a property and bought this apartment building for a million dollars and it was returning income for you, you would get a 2% return on your investment. So that didn't meet my goals. My goals is creating wealth, cash flow for my family, financial freedom, quit my W2 job, 2% returns, and you're going to cut it. So that's when you evaluate the opportunity cost of an investment. And to me, I didn't see the opportunity cost of investing in Hawaii real estate multifamily better than if I go stateside, develop it, create a team in a market that's a lot more affordable, the lower barrier to entry, higher capitalization rates, meaning I get more return for my investment, my capital injected. And all I had to do was just do a little bit of more work up front, developing a team and a system, a management team on place to execute that, it was well worth it. So that is why I do have some, I have that one single family house over in Capile, and it's doing great as a very long term rental, but it's not something that's going to let me quit my day job. So it's all about what your goal is. And I know a lot of people that do single family rental here or small and multi here, and that's great. And that's going to work well for them. But it just, it didn't, wasn't the tool for me to reach my goals. So what, what do you look for in an investment when you're out on the, you know, the MLS or you're looking, what is it that catches your eye? What are you looking for in efficiencies? So as a, as the asset manager in acquisitions director, I look for properties. So our buy box right now is, I'm going to go down real quick, and we kind of break it out is I look for C class and B class value add multi family anywhere from 50 to 100 units is what our general buy box is.  And they're just kind of been trucking along the last, you know, 20 years, but they don't really have any efficient business systems in place or kind of just running it as a almost like their hobby or side job. And you can see a lot of inefficiencies in the way they do management like rents are really low deferred maintenance is kind of creeping up. And that's what we look for is management inefficiencies and, you know, low rents, some deferred maintenance and we can go on there and we can implement our systems and increase the marketing, renovate the units is something that the residents in that community really want. Because they're usually outdated units. And increase rents decrease expenses is another big thing I look for I look at profit loss statements. And I look for expenses that are just way over what they should be for that market. And that's where I kind of queue in there like, okay, we can shave off 20% here, the water bill is crazy high, they probably have some leaks they haven't been addressing, and things like that. And I can increase the value of the property. Because once we cross over, if you remember earlier, I mentioned the sub five unit properties are called residential, once you go over five units called commercial, and they're valued entirely different. And that's where the power and the wealth creation from multifamily really kicks in. So the goal in multifamily is to increase the NOI, the net operating income. And you can either do that by increasing the income or decreasing the expenses. And if you can find a way to do both, you're going to do very well. So we find properties that the rents are maybe $100 below market, so we can bump those up to 100 bucks. And then we find properties where maybe the expenses are 20% over what they should be. So we trim them down, get the expenses down to where they should be, and say we add, you know, $300,000 in net operating income. Well, you divide that or put that on like a six cap or something like that, a six capitalization rate. That could be, you know, millions of dollars in value just created by just finding a property that's running inefficiently, and getting it tuned up, getting it on par with the rest of the market, and making a clean safe place that residents in that community love coming home to every night, and creating a community there. And you will do pretty well for yourself and your group and your investors if you bring on investors. Wow. So that leads us into bringing on investors. How are you funding these multi-door investments? Great question. So there's several tools for that as well. And a lot of it is, what is the best tool for the job? There's, if it's small units, say maybe sub 350 units, we'll do what's called a joint venture, where we get a very small group, maybe two, three, four of us, and we'll all chip in, you know, 25% down payment by the place, put it in our management system in our portfolio, and run it. Once we get over that maybe 50 unit, 100 unit type place, we bring on other investors. And those other investors come from our personal relationships, maybe your friends, family, co-workers. We have our meet-up like the Honolulu multifamily and more, or our podcast or other things like this, where we develop relationships with other investors that are looking to get into bigger properties, but they can't do it on their own. They understand the power of the multifamily investing, but they see the barrier entry too high. So they can use us leverage us in our experience to get into those better class assets.  It's pretty powerful stuff. Wow, yeah. So if one of our viewers is interested in investing, can they do that with you? Or is it something you want a relationship already standing? Great question. So legally, we have to have a, because we do what's called a, so Reg D, 506B is the SEC regulation for how you can legally bring capital to a deal. So right now I can't like solicit a deal. I can't say I have, you know, one, two, three main sheet, 50 grand, somebody come, like that's illegal, I'll be in a red jumpsuit or orange jumpsuit by the end of the day, or whenever they see this. So I can't do that. But what we can do is if you're interested in learning more, we can develop that relationship. And it's, it takes time, right? Because we have to have a substantial relationship. We have to make sure you have to kind of see if we're the right fit for you. We have to see if we're the right fit together. Just a partnership. It's not, it's not like going into like Edward Jones or something like that and giving your money to a financial advisor. It's, we're going to be in this thing together. We're partners on a deal. That's the relationship you want to build. So we want to make sure we have the same goals, we have the same ethics, values, principles, same timelines, all of that stuff comes into play to make sure that it's almost like getting into a marriage. We want to make sure that we're the right fit because we're going to be tying the knot for five, 10 years as we get into this investment vehicle together. So we want to make sure that we have a good substantial relationship and we're the right fit before going into that. So if you're interested, the Tri-City Equity Group has a portal on there where you can contact us and we can just set up a call, go out, go out to lunch, have coffee and we can start there and see where that goes. Yeah. So we only have a couple minutes left. So what advice would you give somebody that wants to get started? What's a couple little pieces of advice? Great question. So real quick, if I had to do it again, I would get absolute clarity on what my goal is. I read a book a while back and it talks about, you know, people relentlessly work through life at whatever the business is if they're in a corporate or whatever the W-2 job is, they get to the top of the ladder and they look around and realize it's leaning against the wrong wall that they spend their whole lives or careers getting to the top of the ladder and it's like, this is not what I want it to begin with in the first place. I want to be over there. So if you're going to get into real estate, get clarity on what you got, what you want, what your timeline is, what your actual end goal is, if it's a cash flow number, if it's an equity number, net worth number, get clear on that and then figure out what the best tool is to achieve that sometime. Maybe it will be, I just want to, I'm going to get a pension, we talked about military pensions earlier before the call, like I don't need a full-blown portfolio, I just need some of the compensate or supplement my pension and that might be, you know, five, 10 units where that's where the duplexes and stuff like that would be great. But if I'm trying to replace my income, I need to substantially a lot more than that and that's where the limiting factor for those properties came in. So get very clear on what your goal is, what your timeline is, why you want that, like what are the drivers for you to achieve that that's going to keep you motivated to doing it. Then get started. A lot of people get analysis paralysis. If you're one of those people, join a mastermind, join a group of other like-minded individuals. You know, we have the Hollywood family more, there's other kind of the coaching type groups where you pay to get into, there can be very beneficial as well. But the point is just get into the game, jump in and get started. I still know people that I talked to from 2015 that we're on the same path and they're still waiting to do their first deal because they always talk themselves out to it.  So get clear on your goals and join a group, get educated on what you're doing. Again, there's a lot of resources out there, books on Amazon, there's a lot of coaching groups and just get into the game. All right. Well, thank you so much. This was awesome information and thank you for joining us. Thank you viewers for being with us on The Life of the Land is in its real estate with Think Tech Hawaii and I will see you all in a couple weeks and we're going to have a visit from another lender to kind of understand where the interest rate's going and how is the market right now. So again, thank you so much. This was wonderful and I will see you all in a couple weeks.


Hi everyone thanks for joining us. No students were on a school bus that was involved in a crash in Bagley this afternoon but the state patrol says five people were injured in the collision. Now these photos indicate the front end of the bus appears to have been damaged in the crash. A witness said the other vehicle involved looked heavily damaged. The Minnesota state patrol says an SUV driven by 33-year-old Megan Reed of Cloquet was westbound on Highway 2. The bus pulled out from Park Avenue to go eastbound on 2 when it was hit by the SUV. Reed along with their husband Adam and their two young children were all taken to Sanford Bagley Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The bus driver 58-year-old Felry Larson of Bagley was also taken to Sanford Bagley with non-life-threatening injuries. The patrol says roads had snow and ice on them at the time of the crash. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.


So in this case, I've gotten a little bit more of a complex tree going on here. And what if, say for example, I wanted to give it the removal operation of Remove 3? Well, since we're in a binary tree, I would first need to find that 3, so I would traverse downward until I found it. And given that's an in, the first step would be I remove in. All right, excellent. Done, haha. Well, you see that now I have an empty spot, and I happen to have two children that I need to be working with.  And in our case, what we can do is we can work off of what we would classify as our in-order predecessor, predecessor. The idea behind this is if we remember in-order, I look at my left children, then myself, then my right children. So in our case, we happen to have removed self from the equation. But what's the next available step? Next in the sense that I happen to have a left child that I can work off of. I happen to have a two. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to move that in-order predecessor, hopefully I can make this in the right amount of space. I move that in-order predecessor to the removed in position. And so as we can see, I would move my in-order predecessor. That's my two in-order predecessor. You'll see that word a few more times. I'm joking. I would move that to my three. So now I would sort of remove that two.  There we go. I would, once again, I'd come in and I would put that two here. So now I've taken that two. I've moved it to its removed in position. And then I splay that predecessor, splay predecessor. So in our case, once again, as we've seen a few times now, I have an x, I have a y, a y, and I have a z. And in this case, I happen to see that it's in a zig, zig approach. So as we've seen in the past, I will change this so that it's an x, y, and z. But you notice that I happen to have a few children going on here. So if we sort of watched our previous videos, that t1 will go to x, that t2 will go to y, and z will get t3 and t4. So in our case, we see that t1, well, guess why? We just happen to move that. So it's gone. However, we do have a t2. We don't have a t3, but we do have a t4. So in our case, if we follow this rule of removing n, we did. We moved the in-order predecessor to that removed location. We did. We splay the predecessor now. So in our case, we see I would change it so that the root node in this case is 2.  So 25 would be here. My z would then be the right child of my y. Now I also have to deal with my t1, t2, t3, and t4. So as you can see, y is going to get t2. So that means that y, 25 in this case, will get my 10. And my z will get my t4. So my z will get my t4.


Hello, I'm Todd Mortensen and this is my family, my wife Deb, my sons Quinn and Jack. We are the 2011 Leopold Conservation Award winners. I hope you enjoy the tour of our ranch. Well, you know, I guess growing up we've all heard of all the Leopold and his conservation ethic and to win an award with his name on it is particularly satisfying because it says to me that what we're doing is up to the ideals that hold the Leopold had. And the things that we have done here have helped in the ranching operation. I don't feed my cattle very much, you know, I don't have to buy a whole lot of inputs. Why? Because I'm taking care of the land and the land is providing those cattle with what they need. You know, we saw a lot of changes happen when we started rotational grazing, when we started moving the cattle around and instead of leaving them in one pasture for three or four months, now they're in a pasture for, you know, maybe a week, maybe two weeks at the most and then they move on, especially in the spring when the grass is growing fast. They're moving, the cows are moving fast at that time. That way they never have a chance to overgraze any plants or degrade an area and especially around riparian areas, you'll really notice a change in those in a hurry. Usually the control of those areas or the restoration of those areas starts on the uplands.  You've got to, they're tied into a system together. So what we've done is take particularly close attention to those riparian areas with our grazing management. You go into an area and if there's some riparian areas in a pasture, you monitor those and when the cattle start having an impact in that area, you get them out. That way they have a chance to grass over. That way when you get a big grain, you've got grass to hold the water back, to slow the water back. And what that does is, is that when you slow the water down, it drops its sediment load. What we've done is we've grown grass and sedges and stuff in the bottom of these draws, let those come back in and those put the brakes on that water and make that sediment stop. You know, it's great for the cows, you've got trees coming in down there, that's great protection for the animals in the wintertime, not only for the animals that I grow, but for all the deer, you know, and the pheasants, grouse, prairie chickens, everything. Just love that vegetation, especially during, you know, the wintertime. This draw behind me is called Todd's Draw and when Dad first saw it in the early 40s, there weren't any trees on it and it was basically just a straight walled wash. We'd get an inch and a half or an inch of rain and the water would gush down it and be off the place in a matter of hours. So now you see it and there's a whole bunch of trees in it. We put some dams in it in the 50s to slow the water down and to hopefully soak it up. And you can see all these trees behind me are a result of putting all that water underground. And that's what we try to do here is put more water down into the sand layer and have it come out wherever it's going to come out. And you can see those spots where it comes out by the trees.  There's very little more that can go on in there. There's very little more room for trees to grow. And that's happening all around the ranch, all along the edge of the flat. There's trees like this coming in. If you work with nature, mother nature has her own fertilizers. Mother nature has her own pest controls. If you work within those, it's a lot cheaper to get by. And then when you do have a catastrophe come along like a drought or a flood, it's a lot easier to get through. You know, it's a lot easier to get through a drought if you don't have a huge debt, you know, from buying fertilizer or seed inputs. If mother nature's already done that for you, it makes a lot of difference. And I don't want to live in a place that I can't be proud of, obviously. This ranch has been in the family now, you know, I'm the third generation. And I guess we try to leave it. Each generation has done something different to improve it. And I don't want to be any different than that. I see areas that I can still improve upon. And it's my goal to make sure, you know, when I hand it to my boys that it's as good as I could do. And hopefully, you know, it'll continue with them, you know, hopefully they will continue. And I think it just has to do with the love of the land. It's not about what I can do to make the most money. It's about what I can do to sustain my livelihood out here and then have something to pass on to my children.


The significance of these guidelines issued after the recommendations by a three member committee of former judge, Mr. Siddharth Lothra, and the Constitutional Bench headed by the then Chief Justice, Justice Bobri. We thought that since it's the latest guidelines having been issued, why not have the insights on the suspects? And Justice Angadhi was kind enough to accept our request. And we would request our viewers who are watching us live on the Facebook and YouTube, as well as on this platform that they should like, subscribe and comment on the YouTube channel of Beyond Law CLC. So that we come to know that what type of sessions you are liking it. And during these testing times, the virtual knowledge is the best way to put things forward. Over to you, sir. Thank you all the viewers. The topic is very interesting. It is very new also. New means, new of the new directions. Exactly 20 days ago, Supreme Court penned down the seven directions. In a so motto prediction, which it took into consideration, the hard facts of the grid are that 17 long years were spent by the complainant to get to fruits of the complaint filed by him. Under section 138 of the NIA act that prompted the Supreme Court of India to address various issues, which concern the long delay in disposal of the cases under section 138 of the NIA act. As the facts emerge, the Supreme Court stated in body of the order that as on 31 12 2019, there were 2.31 crores of cases pending on the criminal side before various trial courts in the country. After that big chunk of 2.31 crores, the complaint under 18 of the NIA act constitutes a major figure that is 35.16 lakh cases. So 25 lakh cases under NIA act are pending across various trial courts of various states and they are languishing there for even a number of years. And the facts quote, in this case, two checks for pays 1.75 lakhs were issued by the drawer of the checks in favor of the payee. And those checks were not honored. The check bears the date to 27.1.2005, where in 2021, 16 years the complainant was going to wait and his appeal was taken by the apex court as the so-mo to the petition. There the apex court laid down 7 important directions, which in fact now assist the law courts, advocates for the complainant and all the stakeholders to get to early disposal of the case in section 138 of the NIA act. And before that, we must have a fair knowledge of projects of the NIA act and projects of CRPC also since they are the one involved in section 138, 139, 142, 143, 148, 148 capital A of the NIA act. I will not take much of the time of the viewers. I know the time constraint, but I must tell you in brief quickly various important sections of the NIA act then followed by a quick pace of projects of CRPC and then take seven guidelines, which case laws are good law, which case laws are said as not good law by the apex court. And we'll take one by one, those seven important facets of the guidance of the apex court in the law case. So, the so-mo to it was disposed of by the apex court exactly 20 days ago, a judgment of five judges of the apex court and the date of order is 16 for 2021. Six of NIA act defines a check as a bill of exchange drawn on a specified banker and is payable on demand. That is what check means under six of the NIA act. One that it picks off the business loss for check being issued and not been paid by the driver of the check to the pay across the counter or through the account of the concerned pay through his concerned banker. So, six picks off the word check, then section seven speaks of the word drawer, the word drawing. The drawer means the draw check and the word pay means the person to whom the check is payable. Draw means the name of the banker with whom the drawer maintains his account is called as the drawing or called also as drawing bank. Then section eight speaks of what's called as holder, nine speaks of the word holder in due course, then 10 speaks of payment in due course. The banker, if he makes payment of a check to the holder or holder decors as per the apparent tenure of the instrument, we see, we speak of what's called as payment by the banker as payment made by it in due course. The banker must not have knowledge that title of the holder is defective, that is the important point. Then 13 speaks of the phrase, but that's called as negotiation instrument. It means a prepositional exchange for a check, 14 speaks of negotiation, then 30 speaks of liability of driver of a check or a bill as the case may be to compensate the holder or pay. So 30 of that is linked with section 138 of their act. 30 says driver has to make payment of the amount of the check to the payee. 138 says for default by the concerned driver, the payee can approach the court and get the one son what is called relief, which is in fact penal in nature. This point is section 30, I mean section 92 of the enact. It states of dishonor of a check or instrument by non-payment by the driver. A driver of a check, this is a check, a word is not paid, that's called as check not being honored on account of non-payment. So section 13, section 92, section 93, they go hand in hand with section 138 of the enact. 93 speaks of duty of the driver of a check to the driver, the duty of the payee to the driver, what's called as notice of the fact of a check being dishonored. Then 98 speaks of no notice to the issue of dishonor if that check is countermanded by the driver of the check. Then comes next day, 180 of the evidence act that speaks of the exemptions with a 16 number and for us for a check the important are exemptions as to the date as to consideration and then that the holder is a holder in due course. Then comes 138 of the enact that states that when a check is to be dishonored on account of non-payment by the driver to the payee who might have sent the check for collection to his banker or might go to the bank for payment of the amount across counter if the check is not crossed and with regard to other things. So the point is here, the punishment is up to two years on with fine which may be twice the amount of check on both that is 138 of the enact. Then that speaks about the aspect of the check being valid for the period of three months from date of issue. So the driver must give the check to the bank for collection or for payment within the period for which the set check is set to be current and valid. Then, then cut the aspect of notice by the driver, notice by the payee to the driver informing the fact of check being honored by the payee bank or may by the drawee bank and these may also the other things which constitutes the offense of section 138 of the enact. I won't take much of the time on all those important messages. Then 141 is the offense by company. They believe that the company also and also the director or officer responsible for the affairs of the company and 140 speaks of the aspect that the accused shall not take the defense before the criminal court in the complaint that here that when check was issued, it might, the check may be dishonored on presentation of the check and for other things. 142 speaks of what's called as time limit for the complainant or the payee to face complaint before the criminal court under section 138 of the enact and filing complaint before the court of medical magistrate or JNFC as the case may be. So the time limit is within one month from the date of arising of the guard of action and the court can condone delay in fit cases if the cabinet could not file complaint within the period of one month from the date of approval of the guard of action. The next point is 142 of the evidence act that speaks of a case where the check is delivered for payment to the other place of the payee etc. So not very important for us. Then comes the aspect of summary trail of the complaint case by the magistrate court under sections 262 to 265 of the CRPC. That comes the aspect of conversion of summary trail into summons trail by the magistrate court if the magistrate feels that the facts warrant to inflict punishment more than one year. So this point is touched by the facts court in the body of its important guidelines. I will take up the issue there in detail. So the next point is payment of interim compensation by the court to the complainant pending disposal of the complaint. So any offenses occurring after 1928 the complainant can move the criminal court for a warrant of what's called as interim compensation which may be up to 20% of the amount of check and the court will and the court is required to grant the set the compensation. Pending disposal of the main maker. Then comes the aspect of delivery of I mean summons preserved by the court on the accused. Our driver by speedpost or by courier or other modes of what you call delivery and one part of a speaks of evidence of propellant or effort of it is equal to the court recording evidence of the complainant physically in the open court. So evidence can be taken into account by the court and protect the only the accused or his counsel will pass some in the center complainant. 146 speaks of bank slip or memo as a prima facie evidence of the fact of the check being dishonored. 147 speaks of the offense being compounded court can compound the court and permit the parties, the complainant and the driver to compound or compromise the offensive and by paying the amount of check with interest and cost as a case. 148 speaks of appellate court in case of our condition suffered by the concerned driver of check to direct him to deposit 20% of the amount of fine or compensation for grant of order of suspension or stay of our condition of the court. This is a new provision which came to force on one nine twenty eighteen. So with that, the CRPC, the important evidence of section two, suppose D of the CRPC that speaks of complaint. Complaint means any allegations made orally or made in writing to a magistrate, staging commission of an offensive but not including a police report or a final report or a challenge under section 173 of the CRPC. Then two, suppose W of CRPC defines the phrase summons case as a case which is not a warrant case. So simple definition summons case is a case which is not a warrant case. So what is called as a warrant case? Section two X defines the word or phrase warrant case as meaning a case concerning an offensive where the court can inflict punishment to exceeding two years. So two years plus up to the aspect of grant of life sentence and also death penalty that is the aspect of trial of a warrant case punishment exceeding two years and the phrase summary case is not defined in the CRPC. So with this, the next point is chapter 15 of CRPC speaks of what's called as complaints to the magistrates JFC or magistrate as we call it in common parlance and 200 speaks of complaint to the magistrate and the magistrate has to examine the complainant on both. So here, as per the ABASC condition, the court can take immediate of the complainant file along with complaint as evidence or as a result in chief. 202 speaks of postponement of issuance of process by the magistrate if the accused resides beyond the territorial restriction of the consent court. Section two X is the accused in a criminal case and the one that get an act at a court in Bangalore in Karnataka and if the case is filed by the complainant say Delhi, so the court at Delhi, JFC at Delhi or MMAT Delhi shall postpone issuance of process to the accused of Bangalore and because he has to make proper inquiry, then only take origins and issue summons to the accused in case accused resides beyond the place of the jurisdiction of the country criminal court. Then 204 speaks of issuance of process by the magistrate that is if the magistrate holds that there is a case filed by the complainant for issuance of process or summons to the accused. Then comes 219 of the CRPC that speaks of joint of charges, so that states that offence of the same type or of same transaction are forming set of the same sequence of elements and if they are within a span of one year then as per 219 of CRPC we can club three offences within one year. So that is what is called as if a trial off more than one offence by one court if one series of acts are so connected together as to form a same transaction. So up to three that can be joined of the courts of actions if they are out of one set or one series of acts so connected with each other and they form the link of the same transaction. Then comes what's called as the chapter 24 of the CRPC not very important chapter 20 speaks of summons filed by the magistrate that is 251 to 259 of the CRPC. So summons trial the important procedure or the following case of what's called as I mean trial by the court under the what the date of the NA act. So what is instruction 251 of the CRPC up to section 256 the magistrate has to follow in case of trial of case of the section 138 of the CRPC even though under section 260 of the CRPC it stays of a summary trial. So for summary trial also the court has to follow the same procedure off is summons trial. So with that the next point is if the accused states the court that this court has no jurisdiction to try the case on account of the fact that the complaint is barred by time or on account of some of the legal issues. Then the magistrate has the powers and section 322 of the CRPC to send the papers to the CJM or to the consent magistrate and then magistrate or CJM will have the power to go further in the matter. So with this brief backdrop I will take down quickly the seven guidelines of Supreme Court of India. I told these backdrops because without knowing them we can't appreciate properly those seven important guidelines. So I will tell now just to begin with the brief backdrop for the PECS court to touch those important aspects and the important issues or factors which the court kept in mind before issuance of seven directions will be held by me to begin with and they concern the aspect of studies of summons on the accused. If more complaints than one are filed by the same complainant address the same accused and there is a list of complaint such as summons in one complaint case and non-service of summons on the same accused in the remaining three or four other complaint cases by the same complainant. So that's called as the aspect of service of summons on the accused by the medium of court by post or by courier service or by speed post or service by the police at case maybe if there are more than one complaints filed by the same complainant address the same accused and under different checks over a period of time. The second point is how many cases between the same parties the court can club are here together that's called as clubbing of cases. As you all know in a civil trial a suit filed by the plaintiff for declaration of title a suit filed by the different separately for grant of separator for injunction address the same owner of property or somebody else. Normally the courts. Normally those cases will go together and they'll be putting off a common trial. So the point is how many cases of check bonds matters filed by the same complaint on the same accused they can be joined together for purpose of recording of common evidence or for taking them on the same date. That is the second point. The third point is nature of trialing summary trial. What about the drop X in what way for the remedy they bought into loop holes. The fourth point is an act of bank accounts. The fifth point is section 2002 of the CRPC summons to be issued to the accused staying beyond the limits of the court issuing summons what safeguards the court must take. The point is the next point is appeals before the court officials high court or Supreme Court of India, whether there is scope for mediation. As I know mediation is a form of ADR that is the civil sphere, whether variation can be used in the context of what's called as the criminal trial of section 138 of the CRPC. The next point is whether the magistrate has got internet powers to review or recall the order of each one of the summons are not. As you all know every court civil court has got the internet power and section 151 of the CPC to recall any order if fresh set of facts are brought before the court. Our court by itself so motor off rearing both sides can recall the order because of its internet powers. Our court can also correct under the CPC by section 152 or 153 also. So that is aspect of civil side whether the same set of rules can be invoked by the trial course the national courts in the context of issue of the summons by a magistrate. Or for review of order by the magistrate on the EFI by the accused saying that it's also a summons to the accused is not proper and that the court is required to vary or change the set order. So with these important, brief, I mean points in mind, and these factors that affects court to develop on those aren't guidelines. I'll not start quickly, they got to the aspect of mechanical conversion by the trial courts of summary trials under sections 262, 265 CRPC into summons trial under CRPC sections 2512, 258 of CRPC. By a magistrates for awarding of sentence more than one year without recording sufficient reasons was an issue before the apex court. The apex court in many cases had the occasion to see the orders of the trial courts, the GMC in which the trial court if it wanted to about sentence more than one year in case of a summary trial. It could not have done it. So the option was for it to convert the summons trial into what's called as a summons trial to convert the summary trial into a summons trial. So that it can give our punishment more than one year and up to two years. So this is the thing which the apex court was disturbed. Many magistrates were not giving sufficient reasons before conversion of summary trial as summons trial under sections 251 to 258 of the CRPC. This is the first point which bothered very much the apex court. The next point is namely the court should hold inquiry before summons to the accused in case the accused resides beyond the limits of the consent court. In that case, the section 2002 and the apex court stated in many cases that the magistrate should hold proper inquiry and pass orders to the accused in this 138 matters if the accused resides outside the limits of the consent state. So extend and then go come in file by the Covenant at a dairy court, the case law of the apex court stated that the court should see the facts properly, say everything properly and then issue summons. In spite of the apex court judgment, many courts were not following the terror of the apex court order. That point was touched by the apex court in this particular seven directions. The next point is whether the trial court should record evidence of the Covenant or whether only evidence of the Covenant will be enough for the court to go forward. The next point is that is what's called as whether the magistrate should examine the Covenant and record his evidence and then go forward. And the second important, the next point is how many cases of 138 of them act by the same component and a same accused over a period of 12 months or one year, they can be joined together, they can be clubbed together. Whether clubbing of cases as in a civil case is permissible in a criminal case in the context of section 138 of their act or not. And in this case, the apex court in the case of Vani Agro Etrapages was a state of Gujarat 2019 Part 10, SSC's Supreme Court General Page 238 held that there can be consolidation of four complaints filed by the same Covenant as the same accused. So in this case, the apex court permitted the Covenant to join or directed the trial court to post all four complaints, filed the same Covenant, arranged the same accused for four different section 138 offenses, that is the ruling of the apex court. Whether this ruling is proper or not, the apex court held that the decision of the Supreme Court in Vani Agro case is good law. So we can post four cases, filed by the same Covenant, arranged the same accused over a period of time and the court shall use same date. In fact, the court can do here what's called as a joint trial or claiming of all those four cases together. So saving of time, saving of manpower, saving of time of advocates for both sides, the court also and the other stakeholders. The next point is out of four cases, in one case only the summons to unmute is served. Remaining three cases, summons to the same accused are not served, how to go forward? Unless the remaining three cases, summons are served, they can't move forward. So the apex court, about the concept of deep service, whether studies of summons, but the same component address the accused in case one is equal to deep service of the summons on the same accused in the remaining three cases. So the apex court, about what's called as deep service and hand and give directions, send that yes, there can be deep service, no need for the court to issue a fresh summons to the same accused in case two, case three or case four if the complaints filed by the same Covenant. The next point is whether the magistrate had the power to recall the order of each month of process by him to the accused under section 138 of the NA Act. Whether the magistrate in a given case, he takes on record complaint of the Covenant and he issues summons to the accused, yes you appear before the court and then you have your defects. So and accused appears and first application recall the order on the ground that you're not power to issue to me the summons. So whether the criminal courts have got the power of recall or power of view, which is available to the civil courts under section 151 of the CACC. So the apex court in this case, touch the aspect in the body of the order. And the apex court in this case held that it's decision in the case of K. M. Matthew versus state of Kerala reported in 1992 part one SSCC 217 as not laying down good luck. The apex court held that the decision of the apex court in K. M. Matthew versus state of Kerala reported in 1992 part one SSCC page number 217 is not good luck as not laying down the correct law. So in that case the apex court held that yes criminal courts have got the power to recall the order of issuance of summons. It has got the power of review. This order the apex court in this judgment of three weeks old held that judgment as not good luck. So a message has no power to recall the summons review is ordered issued by him under one state of enact to the accused accused can change the order only before the high court under section 482 of the CACC. So this point the apex court dealt with the next point is whether the criminal court has got the power to stop proceedings under section 258 of the CRPC. The accused appears before the court and he says yes sir I will pay the amount of check. He says I will pay the interest amount also whether the court can stop proceedings under section 258 of CRPC. In this case the apex court held that it cannot stop. The apex court held that it's decision in the case of meters and instruments per weight limitator versus Kanchanah Mehta reported in 2018 part one SSCC 518 as not laying good luck. My point is edition of two years edition of only 2018 the apex court held in this case of I mean 16th of April that the ratio in that case is not good in law. The ratio in meters and instruments per weight limitator versus Kanchanah Mehta 2018 part one SSCC 518 is set by the apex court as not laying good luck. So here the apex court held that court cannot stop proceedings under section 258 of CRPC in case of complaints under section 138 of the NIA. The other point which the apex court evolved was that the judgment of the apex court in Adalat Prasad versus Ruklal Jindal that is 20 ready 2004 part 7 SSCC page number 338 and Supramaniyam Sintra Supramaniyam Sintra Raman versus Chetap Maharashtra that is 2004 part 13 SSCC page number 324 they do not require reconsideration. The apex court held that judgments in the case of Adalat Prasad and the case is Supramaniyam Sintra Raman they laid off proper president proper state of law they do not require review or recall. So that is the point is the trial court has no power to recall the all of the sons of sons by the court to the accused that power is there only within the high court under section 482 of the CRPC that addition in Adalat Prasad case and Supramaniyam Sintra Raman case. The next point which the apex court touched was that the court master court has the power to stay proceedings before each under section 322 of the CRPC. In case of this complaint case of one decade of enact if the accused appears and informs the court that it does not have the jurisdiction to try the case and in that case court has the power to stay its proceedings because the power of the court to try the case is at stake. So the apex court with their own backdrops submitted at the end that the appellate courts that is court of decisions, the high courts and Supreme Court of India can involve or start the process of settlement by means of mediation. So mediation process the apex court held that the court of decisions, the high courts and the apex court can make use of to see that there is disposal of more number of cases under section 138 of their act. So with all these important backdrops I will now take quickly those seven guidance. I have made my task now very simple and easy. I give you all the backdrop. The first point is before conversion of a case from summary to summons case, a magistrate before recording order before conversion of trial of complaints from summary to summons case or summons trial should record reasons. So a magistrate under section 138 of their act should give reasons before converting trial of a complaints case under one thing to enact from summary trial under section 260 to able to put it in a CRPC to what's called as a summons trial under sections 252, 258 of the CRPC that is the first important point. Any magistrate who wants to award punishment more than one year and he wants to switch on the trial from summary to summons trial then the magistrate shall give invariably reasons to switch off the case from the summary to what's called as a summons trial under sections 252, 258 of the CRPC that is the first guideline. So trial courts are now required to you proper reasons they cannot just say in a online order yes I want to impose punishment more than one year. So I convert the trial as a summons trial. They must now give or spell out proper reasons for conversion of a case from summary to what's called as a summons trial under sections 252, 258 of CRPC. The second guideline is namely what's called as in any case where the accused recites beyond the directory limits of the consent court with issues summons to the accused accused staying at a place beyond the limits of the consent court. Then the second balance is that the court shall invariably give proper reasons before issuance of summons by it to the accused and what they did of an act if he recites in some other place beyond the place of location of the court issuance summons. So a party staying at Bangalore case where before a court at Delhi so the example is like that so in that case so Delhi court for a summons to the accused at Bangalore shall record reasons before issuance summons to the accused who is staying at Bangalore now. So the apex court in this case took the point that is the ratio in the case of Birla Corporation Limited versus Advents Investments and Holdings Limited 2011 part 16. That's the CC page number 610. In that case the apex court held that the word covenants used in the CRPC section 200 means the court taking judiciously effect or effect in a view to initiate proceedings. So the apex court in the case of Birla Corporation Limited held that court must apply a mind before issuance summons to the accused and in case of the accused presiding outside the limits of the consent court. Then court has got one more step one more added what you call limitation. It shall record the reasons before the court issuance summons to the accused presiding beyond its territorial limits. So the apex court took note of the decision in Birla Corporation Limited 2019 part 16 SCC page number 610 and here the court held that court must go through the records properly and then go forward before issuance summons to the accused presiding outside HMS. In that case to prevent innocent accused persons from harassment at the hands of unscrupulous complainants in the false complaints. To see that false complaints are nipped in the facts, the apex court later the ratio as per the second deadline in the above case court must give reasons, court must see all the records properly more so if the accused resides beyond the limits of the locality of the consent court. The apex court further held in the above case that the apex court there further held that in the case of Abhijith Pawar versus Hemant Madhuka Nimmalkar 2017 part 3 SCC page number 528. The apex court held that under section 202 of the CRPC the court shall apply mind and whole inquiry before issuance summons to the accused presiding outside its jurisdiction. So Abhijith Pawar versus Hemant Madhuka Nimmalkar 2017 part 3 SCC page number 528 the apex court held that inquiry means proper applying of mind by the court before issuance summons to the accused. That is the purpose is to see that false complaints are nipped in the facts and that the accused staying at far off places are not troubled by issuance of summons by the court mechanically that is the spirit of the judgment in Abhijith Pawar. This is ratio apex court made of in the body of the important guideline. Abhijith Pawar versus Hemant Madhuka Nimmalkar 2017 part 3 SCC page number 528 the apex court held also that its decision in the case of KS Joseph versus Phyllis Carbon Black Limited 2016 part 11 SCC page number 105 is not good law. The apex court held that decision in case Joseph versus Phyllis Carbon Black Limited 2016 part 11 SCC page number 105 there the concerned citation stated that I mean the ratio in the case the apex court held as bad in law. The apex court also held that addition in Vidya Danuka versus Najima Mamtaj 2014 part 14 SCC page number 638 to the effect that the word shall in section 202 class 1 of CRKC. Prima Faisi makes enquiry or investigation as case may be by the magistrate mandatory so the court added that purpose of amendment of section 202 was essential as false complaints are filed against persons residing at far off places and to harass them. So the guideline stated the court shall apply mind properly and record reasons for example summons to the accused who reside outside the limits of that concern court. So with that the next important point is namely for recall of the summons the recall of process by the criminal court to the accused the accused can move the court under section 482 of CRKC but he cannot move the national court. The third guideline is namely the court can take account the overall evidence of the complainant as he is examination in chief. So the third guideline is for conduct of enquiry under section 222 of CRKC evidence of the witnesses on behalf of the complainant shall be taken on IP derivative. So the passport held that the magistrates should not insist for recording of evidence of the complainant or witnesses physically and they can just give their appropriate evidence and subject themselves for process submission by advocate for the accused. So out of 18 rule 4 of CPC states that the court did not record the chief of the witness and the court can now take what's called as elementary chief under all of 18 rule 4 CPC the same analogy is made up by the apex court in the above case. So the fourth guideline is proposed amendment to section 219 of the CRPC the apex court held in the above case by giving the fourth guideline saying that there should be amendment to section 219 of CRPC of one trial agonist a person for multiple offenses. Under section 138 of the ENI act committed within a span of one year or 12 months in spite of deliberations under section 219 of the CRPC the apex court laid down the fourth guideline saying that for multiple offenses between the same parties, same complainant, same accused for a period of 12 months. There shall be one trial but not separate trials and there is need to what's called as amend the section 219 of the CRPC that is the what is called fourth guideline of the apex court. The apex court in the case of Balbir versus state of Haryana that is 2000 SSCC page number 285 Supreme Court held that under section 219 and 220 of the CRPC if there are several offenses as part of the same transaction. And if they are looking with one another in point of time, purpose, cause and effect on as principal and subsidiary then we can say that there is one continuous action even though different offenses might have been committed by the said persons. The fifth guideline is what's called as to treat someone served in one case on the accused as game service on the remaining complaints filed by the same complainant as the same accused under sections 138 of the ENI act. So there are four complaints filed by the same complainant as the same accused by. In the first case, the happens to accused serve case number two, three and four, someone is not served. Then the fifth guideline stated that to treat service of someone's in one complaint case under 138 forming part of a transaction as game service for all the remaining complaints filed before it, the same court concerning check bonds under section 138 of the ENI act as part of the same transaction. So no need for the accused, no need for the complainant to take first steps accused in case two, case three or case four, someone served in first case is said to be taken as game service for case two, case three, case four if the respondent if the accused is common and the complainant is common. The sixth guideline is that is a trial court or a measured court has no internal power to review or recall is order of issuance of process that is 60 pound guideline. The criminal courts have no power of recall or review of order of issuance of summons or process to the accused under section 202 of the CRPC and that power is there only with the high court under section 482 of the CRPC. The trial courts have no power of review or recall of order of issuance summons to the accused and the only thing which the accused can do is approach high court and get recalled or cost the complaint under section 138 of the ENI act. So the apex court held that its decision in Adalata Pasar case and Subramaniam Chetaram case which I stated just now Adalata Pasar's case is 2004 part 7 SCC page number 338 and Subramaniam Chetaram I told the citation. So they lay down good luck. It's five o'clock. They lay down proper luck and the next point is a measured court has no power of recall or review of order of issuance of summons or process to the accused under section 138 of the ENI act or under any other offenses under any other acts or enactments. So in this case the apex court held that its decision in the case of K. M. Mathieu versus Sir Chetaparala that is 1992 part 1 SCC page number 207 is not laying good luck. So good luck is case of Adalata Pasar and Subramaniam Chetaram that they told previously and the decision in this case Mathieu case is not good luck as told by the apex court as the guideline number 6. The seventh guideline is lastly why cannot invoke section 258 of the CRPC for complaints under section 138 of the ENI act. The seventh point is 258 of CRPC cannot be applied to complaints under section 138 of the ENI act. So the apex court held that its decision in meters and instruments private limited versus Kanchan Mathieu 2018 part 1 SCC page number 560 to the effect that principle of section 258 CRPC will apply and that the court can close the case and discharge the accused. If the amount of check is paid with cause and interest is not good luck. If the accused pays check, amount of check plus cost plus interest also the court cannot discharge the accused and it held that court cannot stop proceedings under section 258 of CRPC. The apex court held that its ratio in meters and instruments is not good luck. So the seventh point stated states that the court under section 118 of the ENI act cannot invoke section 258 of the CRPC that is the seventh guideline of the apex court. So with that and the apex court order that there be amendment to the ENI act which can empower the magistrate course to recover or review this order and proposal to amend section 29 of the CRPC to include in one trial cases up to 3 or 4. So that is the amendment sought for by the apex court as per the proposals. So with this I have completed the seven deadlines of the apex court in the above case. And with this, if you got any doubts or opinion on or want any other clarification, I request to the audience and the other stakeholders for participating to have what you call interacting session. And the first curtain is to sum up first curtain is to convert a trial from summary to summons. The court shall record proper reasons. It's the first one. Normally all these days the courts were converting a case summary trial as a summons trial mechanically. So the point is court should record reasons. First guideline. Second point is the court should apply mind before it issues summons to the accused presiding beyond his territorial limits. The court shall apply mind properly before the inquiry. More so in case of an accused who is residing beyond the limits of the consent court in the second important guideline. The third guideline is namely court can take evidence of evidence of the component. Court insist for recovery of evidence of component or witnesses. The court can just take directly cost estimation of the component or witnesses by the location of the accused and case maybe so to make use of the components. Or evidence of the witnesses as the evidence on record as if the court has recorded it by itself. The fourth guideline is amendment to section 29 of CRPC to club three or four offenses by the same accused. And the complaint is common for the purpose of one common trial. So there are four complaint cases. Four complaint of one year. The CRPC does not provide for webbing of all those four cases. And the first court held that amendment to the CRPC so that in one year if they've got four or five check-in-on cases. Same parties are there. Then they will try together and the court can pass a common judgment or a common order. But now we have got the case law of the first court which permitted that we can have trial up to four cases. Court can post them on a common date and it's both of them by what's called as a separate judgment. The fifth guideline is namely what's called as deep service. In the first case seven-third case number 234 of semi-court not sir to take service of someone from first case as deep service for case number 234. The sixth point is no power is for the criminal court to recall or review is order of which ones of summons or process to the accused. That is the sixth point. The seventh point is the court cannot stop proceedings. I'm the 6223 of CRPC and judgment in meters and instruments case is set as background law. So this will now take up inquiries of the audience. The audience are drawn from advocates plus students of law like this. So this is a live topic and I thought that we would have a proper discussion so that we could not have it properly. So following these guidelines by the courts will help in this for the law of cases at a fast pace. So the upright courts they can you know the medium of mediation. So this is a new article thinking in the aspect of criminal law which we call mediation in the context of a family court matter in the context of a civil matter. Mediation and this mode of area of the CPC is sought to be made up by the upright course that a corner stations, high courts and Supreme Court of India. Yes. The session as usual where we have all had sessions with you they have always been to the point and very illustrative and exhausted. And more so once we have taken on the topic which just came as you rightly said way back only on 20 days ago. Before we take one question we will ask Mr. Prem who's from Canada. What insights like the previous session we were discussing about the Alam Prasad and recalling past to where it can be done or it cannot be done. When I will ask Prem also when we say that there's no power of recall do we say it is akin to the power of what we can say in the normal parlance. Does the court become a Functus official just what we a common parlance used under the labour court. What is your take on that? Well I would say that any court irrespective of whether it is civil or criminal have the power to recall. It's odd because if you closely read the maximum act is curing limiting gravity which means that an act of courtship prejudice is no matter. So if the court does say wrong the court has to undo the wrong. See of course Adalat Prasad and Subramaniam Sethuraman both of 2004 which again was followed in Hariwal of 2009 which of course have been held by this constitution as good law. See it nearly dealt with K. M. Matthew word the court of issuance of the summons and issuance of the summons that itself was sought to be recalled. That could not be done like that but if it was a case of fraudulent issuance of summons. Then of course the court is because it was confined nearly to one custody and Matthew was confined nearly to one custody. Whether you can recall the summons whether the magistrate thinks or who issuance of summons can recall it or not. And kindly see Adalat Prasad first said that only option is under 482 which again goes on to get reiterated in Sethuraman. Now kindly see both these judgments did not consider the matter that a summoning order is a reviseable order. It is not a mere interlocutory order. Instead of 482 the accused is having the option under 397 because CRPC provides for that even a plethora of Supreme Court judgments also. So that is my take on this recalling. So kindly see this particular judgment with which we are now dealing with in this particular topic or in this particular topic I would say. You can see it is alarmed by the inundation of trial terms with lakhs and lakhs of changes on the cases. In this constitutional bench headed by Justice Bobby issued a slew of directions that is seven directions on this somoto writ regarding expeditious disposal of cases under 138 of the NIR. Absolutely true. It is a highly highly welcome step. But sir, I have a few doubts in the sense you read the judgment. We see that the court was first concerned with especially petition regarding dishonor of checks which was pertaining to around say 16 years tendency. And then the court takes up a somoto repetition merely to consider certain aspects, appoints an ambiguous jury and then comes back with a judgment. Now earlier it was a three judge bench which was dealing with this particular matter. Then the three judge bench, they felt the necessity for having a larger bench to deal with certain issues. A five judge constitution being just constituted which has given a certain guidelines, seven in numbers. Kindly see after this particular seven guidelines the Supreme Court immediately goes on to see that this matter is not finally heard and further hearing of this matter will be before a three judge bench. After the guidelines as Supreme Court is saying, please list this matter of eight weeks and further hearing would be after, I mean before a three judge bench. So my first question is whether this is an interim order or not. Then my second question would be, of course it's a highly welcome step, no doubt regarding that. Now the court would say that epitaphic evidence is suffice at the initial stage. Kindly see sir, taking cognizance in this particular thing is by means of 190 cross section of one subclass A of the CRPC. If you read section 200 of the CRPC, 200 starts with the words, a magistrate taking cognizance, he shall examine the complainant upon court and the witnesses also. And the substance of that examination which shall be reduced to writing, of course, affidavit also is in writing. Signed by the complainant and the witnesses, of course affidavit also would be and also by the magistrate. If it is affidavit of evidence, it is not signed by the magistrate. So that would be short circuiting the CRPC. Number one, for which the Supreme Court does not have the power in my humble opinion and going by the prethor of judgements. And kindly see sir, regarding conversion to someone's crime, section 143 of this Negotiable Instruments Act that was inserted by the MND Act 55 of 2002, which itself specifically provided that for the trial under 138, section 138 it shall be conducted under section 262 to 265 CRPC. And there is a second proviso to section 143 that if during the course of a summary trial, if it appears to the magistrate that the nature of sentence to be imposed, it exceeds a particular period, then the magistrate and that it is undesirable to try this case summarily, the magistrate has to record the reason. So we do not need a Supreme Court order for that because 143 second proviso makes it absolutely clear that the magistrate is duty bound. And if you read this particular section, I mean section 161 of the CRPC also, it is there in the CRPC. Because what makes my mind is, see Supreme Court itself in Prakashnath Khanna, that's a 2004 9 SCC 686. The Supreme Court goes on to say that if the language employed in a statute, because that is the determinative factor of the legislative intent, the court cannot correct or make up any deductions in that language, that is what the Supreme Court holds. Then comes another Supreme Court judgment, Delhi Financial Corporation's case, 2004 11 SCC 625, reiterating this position. Then 2004 6 SCC page 210 says when the legislative intent is clear, then the court is duty bound to give respect to each and every word which is used by the legislature. We have a plethora of presidents and sir, there is a constitution bench decision which dates back to 1950. That is the decision in K. S. Chandra Vandalski's year 1950 Supreme Court 265 because here the Supreme Court was concerned with the hardship factor. The constitution bench early during 1950 goes on to say that hardship or inconvenience cannot alter the meaning of the language employed by the legislature if such meaning is very clear on the very piece of the statute. And of course we have a plethora line of judgments which would say that it is for the legislature to amend the law and not for the court. And the court cannot legislate under the garb of interpretation and the court cannot even seek the legislature to amend laws because there should be some sort of judicial restraint and the temptation for judicial legislation. It should be issued by the courts, says the Supreme Court in a couple of rulings. In fact, judicial legislation even in the Supreme Court, that is what did not. 2003, 2001, SCC 730. Giniya Keetan's case of Supreme Court states, in fact, judicial legislation is an oxymoron. This is the word the Supreme Court said. I will answer your question one by one because there is only one way traffic and we miss the first where we have to answer. So I have just made one of the points there. The first point is you told that the Supreme Court here guidelines. At the end, the Supreme Court told, let the case go back to the range of procedures. That's your first important attack. There is no full-fledged trial of that concerned repudiation with the Supreme Court. But here my point is, the best code laid down the seven guidelines to be followed by the trial codes under Article 141 of the Constitution. The trial codes are bound. The trial codes are no option. If they just don't follow it, they will sue for content. So Article 141 of the Constitution comes into play. So these guidelines, the trial codes shall follow invariably. There's a question of choice. There's a question of any element saying that if I like it, I'll follow. If not, I will not do it. The second point is per age of the last, per eight of, I mean, supper eight of paragraph 24 of the above judgment states that the uppercase code laid down seven guidelines. I told you already. All other points, which have been raised by the uncaled scurry, it is from the report to the Supreme Court and written submissions and not considered hearing. They shall go before the three judge bench for hearing. So questions of point of fact, and this seven point uppercase code laid down guidelines. Those points, they made minus. The uppercase code held it for other points, not covered by us as per point number one to seven. Let me go back to the three judge bench and that code shall dispose of the complaints under section 138 of recovery of one point somewhere less, which was lent by the number two that used 16 years ago. So I am also meaning that the uppercase code was the right in laying down the guidelines for the seven. Number two is the uppercase code had the power to send the case to the three judge bench to hear and dispose of the main matter, the main MP, and also touch other aspects of the primary thought during the uncaled scurry and also there are no talk submissions in writing. So across, I mean, separate age of para 24 of judgment of the uppercase code says in very clear terms. There's no ambiguity at all. But these seven guidelines, we are going to follow. Why no option? And we are going to say that let the Supreme Court need not venture to the field of the legislators. And see, in many cases, the uppercase code has stepped in and told that yes, until the law is there, yes, this is the ratio and we are going to follow. And in many cases, the effects quotes, what do you call directions? Even though there is no specific law, the parliamentarians took it feasible to amend various laws. So we have seen in many cases, say, SCST, I mean, the Supreme Court judgment came, then they amended the SCSTP Act. Then there were better of the legislation's consent amendment to various acts, which are of shots of the judgment of the office code, laying down what is the ratio to be governed for the consent cases to be tied by the trial codes. And we can't just keep aside the amendment of the uppercase code in the case of Adalat Prasad, 2004, Part 7, SSCC, Page No. 338, and also, Superminium, Sethuram v. Mr. Maharashtra, 2004, Part 13, SSCC, 324, since the uppercase code held in body of the order, same order, that they do not warrant any reconsideration. As was told, power of review, power of recall of summons by a magistrate to the accused, that power is not there for a magistrate. The magistrate cannot recall the order of the summons. The magistrate cannot review the order of the summons, even by chance, by mistake. The remedies approach the high court only under section 42 of the CRPC. So in those two rulings, they have not told that the alleged person, the accused, can move a judge's court under section 337 of the CRPC. So these two laws, these two cases are said by the uppercase court as being good law and they require no reconsideration. The uppercase court also held that the decision is not there. I mean, the uppercase court held that trial court cannot be conferred with independent powers to review or recall the order. But they are given a right if the court has a jurisdiction and the accused does the court that you're not restriction. Then the uppercase court told court can move section 322 of CRPC and state proceedings send the court to CJM or to the court having jurisdiction. That important step the uppercase court has stated in the body of the very order. And my important point is, we cannot do anything beyond the following the president of the uppercase court, let alone in a given case. And if the facts and here in here, these seven guidelines were an option. We're going to say that for our facts, this is an application. So the guidelines are there. And they have also proposed for amendment to section 219 of the CRPC that are also proposed. And they also sought for proposal to amend other aspects of the CRPC also. I'm very sure that see in fact you just touch the important points, but we cannot go behind the orders of the effects court, which the effects court voted in the body of this order. Saying which are cases laying down good luck, which are cases not paying good luck. And the uppercase court held that judgment in KM Matthew versus state of Kerala. That is one my main two part one SSCC page number 217. We stated that the criminal court have got the power of view or call of order is set up as court in this judgment only as not good luck. So with this, I think now he's 25, 20, 25. I think I'll make clear to our friend, Mr. Menon from Kerala, but he had very nice points to submit because he touched various facets. But for us, the body called Stope is very narrow. Say about seven guidelines, say which is good luck, they say which is not good luck as told by address court in the body of this judgment. And this is a very short judgment and consisting of as many as 26 paragraphs and only parrots, apparently 24 is really important. They have given these seven guidelines. This is my Naveen Kumar, punishment for dishonor of check is up to two years as per section one at 38 of Negotiable Instrument Act. And as per section 260, sub clause one, sub clause I, summary trial may be done in such cases. So what is the criteria of converting a summary trial to a summons trial as punishment is limited to two years only and thus punishment does not seem to be the criteria. So the office court, they just order as per point number one, the high courts are requested to show practice directions to the magistrates to recall regions before converting trial of complaints under 138 from summary to summons trial. What is called a summary trial? What is called summons trial? I will tell you just in the beginning only. So if the magistrate wants inflict punishment more than one year, then he has got the option to switch on from what's called as summary to summons trial under section 212 to 15 of the CRPC. And for that, the office court told that the court shall record reasons as to why it wants to award to the accused higher punishment more than one year and switch on to the what you call summons trial and not resort to the summary trial with which it had started. So that is the aspect of the first important point and the office court had told in many cases for conversion of the trial from summary to summons, there shall be alternating saying or stating reasons, but still that ratio wasn't followed by many courts. And so for example, taking steps of contempt, the office court in this case, later on, this is a case of a lot of bench of fighters, they later on once again, the very same ratio saying that high court requested to show practice directions to the magistrates saying that record is before conversion of a case from summons, a summary to summons trial under the CRPC. So court can award punishment more than one year if it's switched on from the previous set of what's called a summary trial to a summons trial. But I have got one area of what you call lacuna in the NA Act. 138 of the NA Act speaks of punishment up to two years and court can then be fined with each double the amount of check 138. Whereas the same provisions of the NA Act, section 143, the subclass 1 states that court has to follow what's called as the trial which is called as a summary trial, subclass 1. And the first order says, provided that in case of any conviction of in a summary trial under the section, it shall be lawful for the magistrate to pass a sentence of imprisonment for a term not exceeding one year. Up to one year court can award punishment in case he holds what is called as a summary trial. And the second order says, if the magistrate wants to give punishment more than one year, as per second order 2, 1.6 plus 1 of the CRPC of the NA Act, it states that the magistrates shall record reasons to convert summary trial as the summons trial to inspect punishment of two years. So here the world is challenged there, that's correct. But still the apes court thought that the trial courts are not following the spirit of the statute and they just put it in the form of what you call the first crime in the particular paramedic court of the NA Act. So my point is 138 speaks of punishment up to two years. Fine being double amount of check. One part of this speaks of punishment up to one year in case of summary trial. And for summons trial the court can let me punishment up to what's called two years. So by this need for the NA Act to have in place 138 and 143 is clause 1 and the two provisions and they will go hand in hand. And to subtract this anomaly, the Supreme Court laid down the first guideline. This anomaly was there to subtract the anomaly in my opinion. They just directed the magistrates to record reasons before conversion of complaints under 138 from summary trial to summons trial. Yes sir. Yes because I think I made much of a mistake. I don't think we have any question as such. And tomorrow we would be having a session on a basic not even as such connected with law law as such but the primary for the purposes of students who are doing law. A lot of people feel that what should be the perspective of having internship and whether it helps in the placements. So tomorrow this session would be internships and significances and placement. That is by Aruna L and CA and each day. They will be giving the insights tomorrow do stay connected with us at 4.30pm. 4pm. Thank you everyone. And thank you on behalf of all those participants who have been watching us live on the Facebook, YouTube and on this platform. And do like subscribe and share our YouTube channel of Beyond Law CLC. Thank you everyone. Stay safe. Stay blessed. And I would request that one should wear the mask and also maintain the social distancing keeping it with the forward guesses. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all the viewers for me also made me to go through in detail. And I'll share with us a brief note which I've prepared of the seven guidelines with all the case laws of the High School. Yes, sir. And we can in turn. You will share it on the WhatsApp group. Yeah, I will just because I've prepared in depth I spent a long time and let it be with you. You can just share to the concerned advocates or anybody who is interested. That's why we say that they should connect on our WhatsApp group of Beyond Law CLC. So that they can get the all the notes, whatever the speakers she is. Thank you everyone. And one more point which I want to say the apex court on about two weeks ago gave 16 directions to the trial course in early disposal of cases pending institution before the civil courts. So they're given 16 guidelines. The best code as well. 224. That is just two weeks old judgment. They got 16 directions. So let on this topic somebody should develop on. And that will also sharpen the minds of the courts, the advocates to see that only a force of degree is received by the degree world. So that's really because I can think of it on this point also that they're being a good. So thank you. Because thank you all the audience.