Gurugram: A woman cannot walk away from a cheque bounce trial just because her husband has promised, on paper, to clear the debt on her behalf. That is the message from the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which last week refused to quash criminal proceedings against a Karnal-based businesswoman accused of dishonouring a Rs 85 lakh settlement cheque.
Justice Alok Jain dismissed the petition filed by Tripti Srivastava and her proprietorship firm, which asked for the Section 138 case (when a bank rejects a payment cheque because an account lacks funds) under the Negotiable Instruments Act against them scrapped.
The complaint was filed by one Yogesh Singla, who had a business dispute with Srivastava and her husband’s company, IQ Med Health Care Private Limited.
The story goes back to August 2023, when the two sides signed a one-time settlement to close out their business dealings.
Under Clause 1.1 of the agreement, Rs 85 lakh was to be paid to Singla—and the company run by Srivastava’s husband agreed to foot the bill “on behalf of both the firms”.
A cheque followed. It bounced. Singla went to court, and a Karnal magistrate summoned both husband and wife to face trial in June 2025.
Srivastava challenged the summons before the high court.
Her lawyers argued that since her husband and his company had taken on the liability in writing, she should not have to stand trial at all.
They pointed to Singla’s own complaint, where he had admitted that the husband had “acknowledged and undertaken” the responsibility to pay. They also cited an order in a separate complaint where Singla himself had said only the husband should be summoned, since it was he who had signed the cheque.
Singla’s counsel had a different story to tell.
He argued that Srivastava had hidden a crucial document, a Special Power of Attorney she had given her husband, authorising him to act on her behalf and agreeing in advance to “ratify” everything he did.
If she were let off now, he warned, her husband could later claim the debt against her firm had already been settled by the company, and the entire case would collapse.
The judge was not convinced by the petitioner’s case.
“Apparently in order to deceive the general pubic at large,” Justice Alok Jain observed, the couple had “created two firms”, one a proprietorship in the wife’s name, the other a private company where the husband was director, even as both had business dealings with the complainant.
The court found it telling that Srivastava wanted to claim the benefit of the settlement agreement while refusing to shoulder her share of the liability under it.
The bench also leaned on a 2006 Karnataka High Court ruling in Mohammed Samdani Bashi vs Syed Issac Basha, which held that since the power of attorney had never been revoked before the cheque was issued, the wife could not use her husband’s admission of responsibility as a shield.
Justice Jain said Srivastava remained “an important party to the lis (lawsuit or dispute)”, since the complainant would still have to rely on her firm’s business dealings to prove a legally enforceable debt existed.
Quashing the case at this stage, the court held, would amount to prejudging issues that ought to be thrashed out at trial.
It also noted that Srivastava had been given repeated chances to show good faith by contributing towards the payment, but her counsel had “categorically declined” to do so.
With that, the high court dismissed the petition, clearing the way for the trial to proceed before the magistrate in Karnal.
(Edited by Viny Mishra)