Delhi District Court
Deptt. Of Customs vs Mr. Ankoo Kohli on 7 January, 2012
IN THE COURT OF MS. ANU GROVER BALIGA:
SPECIAL JUDGE - NDPS
PATIALA HOUSE COURTS : NEW DELHI
C.R. No. 15/10
ID No. 02403R0131582010
Deptt. of Customs
(Preventive Commissionerate)
Through Sh. Harbhajan Singh
Deputy Commissioner (P)
New Customs near I. G. I Airport
New Delhi .... Petitioner
Versus
Mr. Ankoo Kohli
S/o Late Sh. Inderjit Singh Kohli
R/o B100, Amar Colony,
Lajpat NagarIV, New Delhi ..... Respondent
Date of Institution : 21/04/2010
Order was resefarved on : 22/12/2011
Date of pronouncement : 07/01/2012
ORDER
1. The present revision petition has been filed on behalf of Department of Customs against the order dt. 21/01/2010 passed CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 1 of 26 by the Ld. ACMM, New Delhi vide which the accused has been discharged.
2. Briefly stated, the case of the revisionist before the court of Ld. ACMM was as follows:
(a) On 28/10/99, premises of first floor above garage of B62, Gujarwala Town, PhaseI, Delhi belonging to the res pondent was searched and the same resulted in the recovery and seizure of smuggled Ball bearings 59, 565 pieces, all of foreign origin of total value of Rs. 1,11,76,250/ (One crore, eleven lakhs, seventy six thousands, two hundred and fifty).
(b) As per the case of the petitioner, the accused/respondent had also voluntarily given a statement u/s 108 of the Customs Act wherein he had admitted the possession of the aforementioned bearings.
(c) After investigation sanction for prosecution of respondent was taken from the Ld. Commissioner of Customs and a complaint u/s 135 (1) (b) of the Customs Act was filed before the court of Ld. ACMM.
(d) During precharge evidence, the prosecution CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 2 of 26 examined three witnesses PW1 L D Rajput, the complainant, PW2 Nirmal Brijlani, PW3 D D Kaushik. The documents proved by these witnesses were sanction order, the panchnama, the summons issued to the accused u/s 108 of Customs Act, his voluntary statement and the arrest and Jamatalashi memos of the accused.
(e) After the conclusion of the precharge evidence the ld. ACMM vide the impugned order discharged the accused by inter alia holding that the proper sanction in the case had not been granted and the sanctioning authority had not properly applied its mind before the grant of sanction of prosecution. The Ld. ACMM has also held that the circumstances on record suggest that the accused had not given any statement voluntarily u/s 108 of Customs Act and that the evidence brought on record by the prosecution is not sufficient to warrant the conviction of the accused and, therefore, he discharged the accused in terms of the provisions of Section 245 CrPC.
3. The order of the Ld. ACMM has been assailed before this CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 3 of 26 court inter alia on the ground that the prosecution had produced enough evidence before the said court to raise a grave suspicion against the accused. It has been pointed out that the entire recovered case property was produced before the Ld. ACMM, the witnesses PW1, 2 and 3 proved the recovery of the Ball bearings from the premises belonging to the respondent, the sanction order was duly proved by PW1 and that, therefore, the Ld. ACMM was absolutely unjustified in discharging the accused. It has been contended by the Ld. counsel for the appellant, Sh. Bahuguna that once the Ld. ACMM had taken the cognizance of the offence and had been, therefore, satisfied that the sanction u/s 137 of the Customs Act had been given and that the said order of taking cognizance was not challenged by the respondent, the Ld. ACMM could not at the stage of framing of charge consider afresh the question of sanction having been granted or not. It has also been contended that Ld. ACMM has wrongly observed in the impugned order that there was no evidence collected on record to connect the respondent with the premises searched, though, the judicial record clearly shows that one Joginder was examined u/s 108 of the Customs Act and in CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 4 of 26 his statement he has clearly stated that the accused had taken the premises in question on rent from him in the year 1999. It has also been pointed out that the prosecution had filed the statement of bank account of the accused and that the same also supports the allegations of the prosecution that he used to pay rent for the premises. It is the contention of the ld. Counsel that at the stage of framing the charge a Magistrate has to only consider the sufficiency of material placed before him by the Investigating Officer and the truth, veracity and effect of the evidence, which the prosecution proposes to adduce are not to be meticulously judged. In support of his contentions, Ld. Counsel has relied upon the following judgements of the Hon'ble Supreme Court pronounced in the cases reported as under:
i) State of M.P. vs. Jiyalal (2009) 15 SCC 72
ii) 2011 (1) JCC 233 Directorate of Revenue Intelligence vs. Pawan Kumar and Ors.
iii) Directorate of Revenue Intelligence vs. Mohd. Anwar 2010 (4) JC 2986
iv) Directorate General of Central Excise Intelligence vs. Brijesh CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 5 of 26 Kanodia 2011 (1) JCC 602
v) Hardev Singh Dhillan Vs. Department of Revenue Intelligence 2010 (1) JCC 342
vi) Ms. Soma Chakravarty vs. Sttae (Through CBI) 2006 (1) JCC 152
vii) Amit Kochar and Anr. Vs. State of Delhi 2007 (1) JCC 709
viii) State of Punjab vs. Leela (2009) 12 Supreme Court Cases 300
ix) Jitendra and another vs. State of M.P. 2002 CRI. L.J. 3211
4. On the other hand, Ld. Counsel for the respondent Sh. H P Sharma has contended that there is no infirmity in the order dt. 21/01/2010 and that the same does not require any interference from this court. He has pointed out various contradictions in the evidence of prosecution witnesses and according to him the said contradictions are sufficient to throw out the case of the prosecution. He has also contended that the fact that the accused was threatened to tender his statement u/s 108 of Customs Act is duly proved by the material on record and that, therefore, Ld. ACMM was perfectly justified in not placing any reliance upon it. He has further contended that the question CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 6 of 26 of sanction granted by the concerned authority is not a matter to be likely brushed aside and he has relied upon some judgments to contend that the requisite of a valid sanction is the independent application of mind to the facts of a particular case. In support of his contentions, Ld. Counsel has relied upon the following judgments of the Hon'ble Supreme Court pronounced in the cases reported as under:
i) Shah Guman Lal Vs. State of Andhra Pradesh (1980) 2 SCC 262
ii) Jaspal Singh Vs. State of Punjab (1998) 7 SCC 289
iii) Chittranjan Choudhary Vs. State of Bihar (1987) 2 SCC 104
iv) Dinesh Borthakur Vs. State of Assam (2008) 5 SCC 697
v) Prakesh Kumar Vs. State of Gujrat (2007) 4 SCC 266
vi) Som Parkash Vs State of Punjab (1991) Supp (1) SCC 428
vii)Gopalchand Khandelwal Vs. DRI 2010 (250) ELT 504
viii) Mansukhlal Vithaldas Chauhan Vs. State of Gujrat (1997) 7 SCC 622.
ix) State of UP Vs. Dr.Sanjay Singh & Ors 1994 Supp (2) SCC 707
x) Seventilal Karsondas Modi Vs The State of Maharashtra Anr.
(1979) 2 SCC 58 CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 7 of 26
xi) Doki Sriramulu Vs Assistant Collector of Central Excise & Custom and anr 1998(36) ELT 247 (Ori)
xii) Y.S.Bawa, Supdt. Customs and Central Excise Vs. Siri Niwas Jain, New Delhi 1985(21) ELT 382(Del)
xiii) Asstt. Collector of Customs (Sachidananda Banerjee) Vs Sitaram Aggarwala AIR 1966 SC 955
xiv) Surjit Kare vs. D.S. Kapoor and Others 2010 Cr.LJ 1008
xv)Ajoy Kumar Ghose vs. State of Jharkhand (2009) 14 SCC 115
5. I have given careful consideration to the submissions made by both the Ld. Counsels and have gone through the entire record and the judicial dicta referred to by the Ld. Counsels. One of the grounds on which the Ld. ACMM has discharged the accused is namely that the sanction order does not reflect the application of mind by the sanctioning authority and the sanctioning authority has not been cited as one of the witnesses. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in its judgment pronounced in State of M.P. vs. Jiyalal 2009 (15) SCC 72 has held that it is not necessary for the prosecution to examine the person, who was the sanctioning authority, to prove the sanction CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 8 of 26 order and that a sanction order, having been passed in discharge of routine official functions, is presumed to have been done in a bonafide manner. In another case reported as Assistant Commissioner Vs. Velliapa Textiles Ltd. (2003) 132 TAXMAN 165 (SC) the Hon'ble Supreme Court has held that :
"The purpose of sanction for prosecution is to prevent malicious and unnecessary prosecutions leading to harassment; it is a condition precedent for the launch of a prosecution. What the prosecution has to prove is that the sanction has been accorded with respect to the facts constituting the offence. Narration of facts on the face of it is desirable but not always essential; if there is no such narration the prosecution must in the course of trial by extraneous evidence prove that those facts were before sanctioning authority who applied its mind to them before the grant of sanction; an opportunity of hearing is not necessary to be given before the grant of sanction. It is purely an administrative act.''
6. Now in the present case also before the Ld. Trial court the witness PW1 L.D. Rajput Custom Officer has deposed that he had filed the present complaint only after obtaining proper CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 9 of 26 sanction and authorisation from Ms. Vijay Zutshi, Commissioner of Customs and the said sanction order has been exhibited as ExPW1/B. This witness has further stated that he identifies the signature of the Commissioner of Custom as he has seen her signature during the course of his official duties. Now in the entire cross examination of this witness not a single question has been put to him that the sanction has not been properly given or that he has wrongly identified the signature of the Commissioner of Custom or that the sanction given is invalid. Further the sanction order ExPW1/B on the face of it shows that the sanctioning authority has considered all the facts placed before it. In view thereof it is not understandable as to how the Ld. ACMM has come to the conclusion that there is no application of mind reflected in the sanction order. Ld. ACMM appears to have been swayed by the argument of the Defence that the sanction order does not make it clear as to which official had put the facts before the sanctioning authority. The Hon'ble Delhi High Court in three of its recent judgments (supra at Sr. No. 2, 3 and 4 in the list of judgment relied upon by the ld. Counsel for appellant) has clearly held that the CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 10 of 26 sanctioning authority is not supposed to mention in its order as to who disclosed the facts to it and how it came to know of the facts of the case and that all that is required to be proved is that the sanctioning authority has accorded sanction for prosecution on the basis of the facts placed before it. The observation of the Ld. ACMM that the sanctioning authority has not considered the fact that the accused had retracted his statement tendered u/s 8 of the Customs Act and that therefore the sanctioning authority has failed to consider all the relevant facts cannot also be upheld in view of the pronouncement of the Hon'ble Delhi High Court in Hardev Singh Dhilon's case (Supra). The H on'ble High Court has held that in the said case that where the gist of the offence, being recovery of smuggled goods from the car of the accused, the panchnama recording the said recovery and seizure is put up before the sanctioning authority and on the basis of the same the sanction is given, it cannot be stated that all the relevant material has not been placed before the sanctioning authority. There is absolutely no law laid down that a sanctioning authority is required to consider the defence put forward by the accused before it has to grant sanction. In my CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 11 of 26 considered opinion the sanctioning authority was not required to be apprised that the accused has retracted his statement u/s 108 Customs Act for even a retracted statement if proved to have been given voluntarily is admissible in evidence against the accused. None of the judgments, on the issue of sanction, relied upon by the ld. Counsel for respondent lays down any such law.
7. The second ground on which the Ld.ACMM has discharged the accused is interalia that there was no material produced by the complainant/appellant herein that connects the premises allegedly searched by the Custom Officers, with the accused. The Ld. ACMM has observed that neither the lease agreement was collected nor it has been investigated from whom the accused had taken the said premises on rent nor has the name of the said person been put in the list of witnesses before the court. In my considered opinion the said observations made by the Ld. ACMM are totally incorrect. It has been deposed by PW1 in his examination in chief that the ownership of the premises in question was verified and as per the investigation carried out it belonged to one Sh. Joginder Chopra CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 12 of 26 who is a distant relative of the accused. PW1 in his cross examination has categorically deposed that though during the course of investigation he could not find any rent agreement regarding the premises that was searched but the fact that the accused had paid the rent by cheque to the landlord was verified. He has also deposed that the accused had agreed to make the payment of the rent vide cheque and that on investigation of the Bank account of the accused at Vijaya Bank Bhikaji Cama Place it was confirmed that the rent was paid through cheque from his account. In his cross examination he has further clarified that the accused had paid the rent of the premises from February 1999 to October, 1999. No doubt this witness admitted in his examination that there was no entry of payment of rent for the month of November, 1999 but in my considered opinion that hardly makes a difference for the search of the premises in the present case was done on 28/10/1999. The contention of Ld. Counsel for respondent that advance rent is usually paid and that the non payment of the rent for the month of November shows that the tenancy already stood terminated, has no relevance what so ever in the context of the CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 13 of 26 present case. The observation of the Ld. ACMM that since name of the person from whom the accused had allegedly taken the premises on rent is not mentioned in the list of witnesses may be correct but then the list of witnesses also does mention that the complainant reserves its right to summon any witness with the permission of the court. It also cannot be ignored that the statement of Joginder recorded u/s 108 of the Customs Act has been placed on record by the complainant and a perusal of same reveals that it was recorded by the Superintendent. Infact this statement has also been exhibited as ExPW3/F during the pre charge evidence of PW3 D.D. Kaushik, the superintendent. This witness has categorically deposed that he had recorded the statement of Joginder and he has also identified the signature of this witness. There is no suggestion but in the cross examination of this witness that the signature of Joginder Chopra do not appear on the said statement or that this witness has wrongly deposed about the recording of the said statement. In such view of the matter it cannot at all be stated that the accused has been able to rebut the evidence produced by the prosecution and to show that he was not in occupation of the CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 14 of 26 premises searched.
8. The next ground which has found favour with the Ld. ACMM is the fact that the material on record suggested that the statement of the accused was not tendered by him voluntarily u/s 108 of the Customs Act. Ld. ACMM has also taken into consideration that the version of the prosecution that the accused was given summons in pursuance of which he appeared before Sh. D.D. Kaushik, Superintendent Custom and voluntary gave his statement cannot also be believed in view of the cross examination of Sh. D.D. Kaushik. Relevant observations of the Ld. ACMM in this regard are produced herein below:
"In his statement said Mr. Kaushik had stated that he served the summons upon the accused under section 108 of the Customs Act and recorded his statement at about 7:00/7:30 p.m. at New Customs House, New Delhi. The Panchnama was prepared at Gujranwala Town, Delhi. PW1 stated that Panchnama was concluded at 7:00 p.m. and it took about one hour to reach the Customs from Gujranwala Town Delhi. In these circumstances Mr. D.D. Kaushik would not have been present simultaneously at two places, one at Gujranwala Town and also at New Customs CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 15 of 26 House for searching and recording the statement of accused Ankoo Kohli."
Ld. ACMM has also noted that the presence of injuries on the body of the accused which were revealed during the medical examination of the accused on the date of his production before the Ld. Duty M.M. do indicate that undue influence was exerted upon him and therefore the statement of accused recorded u/s 108 Customs Act becomes irrelevant.
9. With regard to the said observations of the Ld. ACMM, Ld. Counsel Sh. Bahuguna has submitted that the injuries on the body of the accused were self inflicted and that without giving an opportunity to the prosecution to elicit the truth from the accused in this regard Ld. ACMM was not justified in accepting statement of the accused that he was beaten by the Custom officials.
10. In my considered opinion also the Ld. ACMM was not justified in coming to the conclusion at the stage of framing of charge that the accused had been beaten by the Custom officials and that therefore is entitled to be discharged. No doubt the medical record available on the file does suggest the presence of CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 16 of 26 the injuries on the body of the accused but it is rightly contended by the appellant that they should at least be granted an opportunity to rebut the allegations of the accused that he was beaten up. Moreover present is not a case where the statement of the accused alone is the only incriminating material collected during investigation against him. The said statement is only corroborative of the fact that a huge amount of smuggled goods have been recovered from the premises under his occupation. Even if one does not place any reliance on the said statement, the fact of the recovery of smuggled goods from the premises of the accused cannot be ignored at this stage. Ld. Counsel Sh. H.P. Sharma has then contended that the said recovery is doubtful and has tried to point out that the case property when produced in the court was not found to be properly sealed and the description of the goods as mentioned in the panchnama did not match with the description of the goods produced in court and that this discrepancy itself is sufficient to doubt the recovery of seizure of goods at the spot. Ld. Counsel Sh. Sharma has also pointed out that the witnesses produced by the prosecution in evidence have admitted that no CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 17 of 26 document regarding purchase of goods by the accused were found and the witnesses have also been unable to tell the number of vehicle in which the case property was carried to the Custom House nor they have been able to produce the proof of payment for the said transportation. He has also submitted that PW L. D. Rajput has admitted in his crossexamination that the market value of the goods allegedly recovered from the premises in question, was ascertained without any document. He has further submitted that the failure of the prosecution to produce the panch (public) witnesses in the witness box shows that no recovery whatsoever was made in the manner alleged by the prosecution. He has further contended that apart from the statement tendered by the accused u/s 108 Customs Act no other evidence has been placed on record by the prosecution to prove that it was the accused who had imported smuggled goods into India and his contention is, therefore, that there is no material on record to prove the case against the accused. In support of his contentions he has relied upon various judgments of the Hon'ble Supreme Court and the Hon'ble High Courts. Ld. Counsel for the respondent has strenuously argued that the CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 18 of 26 accused has already faced trial for twelve years or so and that he should not be made to face trial for another decade only because the prosecution has still an opportunity to produce postcharge evidence.
11. In rebuttal to the said contentions , Ld. Counsel Sh.
Bahuguna has submitted that there is no material difference between the description of the goods mentioned in the panchnama and that produced before the court. He has also submitted that since the case property was bulky and a whole truck load of ball bearings was seized from the possession of the accused and were produced in Court after a long period, some of the seals had broken but that cannot be a ground for giving benefit of doubt to the accused. He has also submitted that in the entire evidence led before the Ld. Trial court there is not a single suggestion put to the witnesses that the goods were not so recovered from the premises in question or that the truck load of goods produced before the court were not the same that were seized at the spot. In support of his contentions he has relied upon the judgment of Hon'ble Supreme Court in Leela's case and that of Hon'ble High Court of Madhya Pradesh in CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 19 of 26 Jitender's case (supra - at Sr. No. (viii) and (ix) respectively in the list of judgments relied upon by the ld. Counsel for the appellant).
12. With respect to the infirmities pointed out by the Ld. Counsel in the evidence produced before the ld ACMM, suffice is to state that at the stage of framing of charge, a court is not expected to sift the entire evidence to reach a conclusion with respect to the guilt or the innocence of an accused. It is now well settled law that at the stage of framing of charges the court is only required to evaluate the material and documents on record with a view to find out if the facts emerging there from taken at their face value disclose the existence of all the ingredients constituting the alleged offence and for this limited purpose only the evidence can be sifted by the Court. In Niranjan Singh Panjabi vs. Jitender Bijjaya 1990 (4) JCC 76 the Hon'ble Supreme Court has held that at the stage of framing of charge the court has to consider the material with a view to find out if there is ground for presuming that the accused has committed the offence or that there is no sufficient ground for proceeding against him and not for the purpose of arriving at CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 20 of 26 the conclusion that it is not likely to lead to a conviction. The judgments referred to by the Ld. Counsel for respondent at Sr. No. (i) to (vi) (supra - the list of judgments relied upon) are judgments that have been delivered by the Hon'ble Courts after the entire trial has been held. In the remaining judgments the facts before the Hon'ble Courts were such that there was no direct evidence to connect the accused with the charges sought to be framed against him and, therefore, the accused was discharged. In the present case it has been rightly pointed out by the ld. Counsel for appellant that a truck load of ball bearings recovered from the premises in question has been produced in court and has been duly exhibited. The prosecution has also brought on record sufficient evidence at this stage to show that it was the accused who was in occupation of the said premises and, therefore, it has been rightly contended that as per the statutory provisions of the Customs Act, a statutory presumption is to be drawn that the accused was found in possession of smuggled goods and it is for the accused to explain that he had nothing to do with the smuggled goods. The lack of documentary evidence with respect to the value of the smuggled CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 21 of 26 goods determined by the prosecution does not take away anything from the charge that is proposed to be proved by the prosecution against him u/s 135 (1)(b) of the Customs Act. Further it is rightly contended by the ld. Counsel for appellant that the provisions of Section 246 of Cr.PC make it amply clear that the prosecution has the right to produce additional witnesses after the framing of charge and that the prosecution will produce the panch public witnesses during postcharge evidence and the fact that the said witnesses have not been produced at the precharge evidence cannot lead to an inference that nothing has been recovered from the premises of the accused.
13. It is relevant to mention herein that Ld. Counsel Sh. Sharma has vehemently argued that the observations made by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Niranjan Singh's case (supra) is with respect to the framing of a charge in a police case and not in a complaint case where it is the provisions of section 245 Cr.P.C. which have application and that the provisions of section 227 and 228 of the Cr.PC. have no application. He has submitted it is for this purpose that in complaint cases the CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 22 of 26 accused has been granted an opportunity to cross examine the witnesses who have been offered at the stage of pre charge evidence u/s 244 (1) Cr.P.C. His contention is that if the accused can show by way of the cross examination that there is no justifiable ground against him for facing the trial, he has to be discharged u/s 245 Cr.P.C. In this respect he has relied upon the judgment of Hon'ble Supreme Court pronounced in the case titled as Ajoy Kumar Ghose vs. State of Jharkhand (2009) 14 SCC 115.
14. The said contention of the Ld. Counsel for Sh.
Sharma is not correct in view of the observations of the Hon'ble Supreme Court given in the case reported as R.S. Nayak vs. A.R.Antulay and another AIR 1986 Supreme Court 2045 (1). In the said judgment the Hon'ble Supreme Court has categorically held that notwithstanding the difference between the procedure in the trial of cases instituted on police complaint and private complaint, a Magistrate is required to consider the question of framing of charge us/ 245 (1) by applying the tests of "prima facie" case. The Hon'ble Supreme Court has also held that the legal position with respect to the CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 23 of 26 framing of charge and the discharge of an accused u/s 245 Cr.P.C. is that if the trial court is satisfied with the prima facie case made out against the accused, charge has to be framed against him and he cannot be discharged u/s 245 (2) Cr.P.C. No doubt in the said case it has also been observed by the Hon'ble Court that the present provisions of the Cr.PC with respect to a warrant case on private complaint, is cumbersome and that the Parliament must simplify the procedure but till the time it is not done, the Courts cannot simply discharge the accused because of the time that is spent in recording precharge evidence and then the postcharge evidence. The reliance of the Ld. Counsel on the judgment of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Ajoy Kumar Ghose's case (supra) is misplaced. The facts before the Hon'ble Supreme Court were that the Ld Trial Court had framed charges against the accused in a warrant case, instituted otherwise than on the police report, without recording any evidence U/s 245 Cr.P.C and it is in the said context the Hon'ble Supreme Court has held that in such cases it is mandatory to record evidence U/s 245 Cr P.C before the framing of the charge for an accused has the right to crossexamine the witnesses produced during CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 24 of 26 precharge evidence and if the accused can show with the help of the said crossexamination that there is absolutely no case made out against him, he is entitled to be discharged. Such a situation is not there in the present case for as discussed hereinabove the prosecution has produced prima facie sufficient evidence against the accused.
15. In view of my discussion hereinabove, it is hereby held that the prosecution had placed sufficient prima facie evidence against the accused before the Ld trial court and that the Ld. ACMM has erred in discharging the accused and, therefore the present revision stands allowed and the impugned order dated 21.01.10 stands hereby set aside. A copy of this order be sent to the Ld. Trial Court. Trial Court Record be also sent back immediately. Accused is directed to appear before the Ld. Trial Court on 13.02.11.
16. This file be consigned to the Record Room.
Announced in open Court th on this 07 day of January, 2012 (Anu Grover Baliga ) Special Judge NDPS : New Delhi Patiala House : New Delhi CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 25 of 26 CR No. 15/2010 Page No. 26 of 26