Chandigarh, March 12 -- The Punjab and Haryana high court has said that to initiate criminal proceedings, a complaint is required from the respective court only where forgery has been committed when the documents are in custody of the court.

".where the forgery of documents has taken place outside the court, but the documents thereafter produced in the court, an FIR/complaint at the instance of a private individual is maintainable," the high court bench of justice JS Bedi said while quashing a Kurukshetra court order.

In the case in hand two persons were convicted for forgery of documents for getting a truck involved in an accident on superdari. However, the appellate court acquitted them on the premise that there was noncompliance of S...