Delhi District Court
In Re: State vs . Ved Singh on 8 October, 2009
1
IN THE COURT OF SHRI GAURAV RAO: METROPOLITAN
MAGISTRATE: DELHI
In Re: STATE Vs. VED SINGH
F.I.R. No: 873/96
U/s 457/380 IPC
P.S. NANGLOI
Date of Institution of Case: 16.05.1997
Date on which reserved for judgment: 08.10.2009
Date of Judgment : 08.10.2009.
JUDGEMENT:
(a) The serial no. of the case : 560/1
(b) The date of commission of offence: 2.11.1996
(c) The name of complainant : Bajrang Lal S/o Jagdish Parshad
(d) The name, parentage, of accused : Ved Singh S/o Ram Saroop, R/o E-
33, Camp No. 2, Nangloi, Delhi.
Present Address : As above (e)The offence complained of : 457/380 IPC (f) The plea of accused : Pleaded not guilty (g) The final order : Acquitted. (h) The date of such order :08.10.2009.
BRIEF REASONS FOR SUCH DECISION OF THE CASE:-
2In brief the case of the prosecution is that on 2/3.11.1996 at time unknown at Village Kamruddin Nagar, Khasra NO. 5, Nangloi Delhi within the jurisdiction of police station Nangloi accused Ved Singh committed house trespass by entering into the above mentioned building of the complainant Bajrang Lal and committed theft of 100 Kg of copper belonging to complainant and thereby the accused committed offence u/s 457/380 IPC.
2. Charge sheet was filed in the court and in compliance of Section 207 accused was supplied the documents. Thereafter vide order dated 19.01.1998, charge u/s 457/380 IPC was framed against accused to which he pleaded not guilty and claimed trial.
3. In order to prove the charges against the accused, prosecution examined four witnesses. After the PE was closed the statement of accused u/s 313 Cr.P.C was recorded on 03.01.2003 wherein he claimed himself to be innocent and stated that he has been falsely implicated in the case. However, he did not offer to lead any evidence in his defence.
A brief scrutiny of the evidence recorded in the matter is as under.
4. PW1 Ct. Pawan Kumar deposed that on 03.11.1996 while he was posted at PS Nangloi he along with ASI Pratap Singh went to 3 the spot i.e. Swaran Park, Mundka where they found one TSR no DER-1080 and one person was sitting in it. He deposed that one secret informer informed that the person sitting in the said TSR was having stolen property. He stated that he along with the ASI apprehended the accused and that time many persons had gathered at the spot. During inquiry the accused disclosed that he had stolen the said property from a factory at Kamruddin Nagar by breaking the roof of the factory. Thereafter, the IO conducted the personal search of the accused, seized the vehicle and stolen property and prepared pointing out memo vide Ex. PW1/A to Ex. PW1/D and after that accused was arrested. He stated that case property was deposited in the Mal Khanna of PS.
5. PW2 Lady SI Savita deposed that on 03.11.1996, while she was posted at PS Nangloi as duty officer on receipt of ruqqa sent by ASI Partap Singh she recorded case FIR no. 873/96. Copy of the same was proved as Ex. PW2/A.
6. PW3 HC Rajinder deposed that on 03.11.1996, while he was posted as MHCM at PS Nangloi ASI Partap Singh deposited the case property i.e. five kattas containing copper and aluminum wire along with one TSR No. DER-1080 and he made entry in register no. 19 at Sl. no. 2407 and kept the articles in Malkhanna. He proved the said entry vide Ex. PW3/A.
7. PW4 SI Partap Singh deposed that on 03.11.1996 he was 4 posted at PS Nangloi and on that day, complainant Bajrang Lal came at PS and made complaint regarding theft of scrap from his factory and he recorded the statement of complainant as Ex. PW4/A. He stated he made endorsement on the same, and handed over to duty officer for registration of FIR and went to the spot i.e. Village Kamruddin Nagar Khasra No. 5 and prepared the site plan Ex. PW4/B and traced out the accused. He further stated that on the same day he along with Ct. Pawan Kumar apprehended the accused (correctly identified) at Swarn Park Nangloi who was in possession of five jute bag containing scrap copper in a TSR bearing registration no. DER- 1080. He stated that he weigthed the gunny bag which was total 70 Kg. He stated that accused disclosed that he was about to sell the same to one Kalu at Swarn Park. He stated that he seized the TSR vide Ex. PW2/B and arrested accused Ved Pal and conducted his personal search vide Ex. PW1/A. He deposed that he recorded disclosure statement of accused vide Ex. PW1/D and prepared pointing out memo vide Ex. PW4/D and recorded the statement of witness and deposited the case property in the Mal Khanna of PS.
8. This witness correctly identified the case property when the same was produced by the MHCM in the court.
9. This so far are the prosecution witnesses in the matter is concerned.
10. I have heard the arguments advanced at bar by the learned 5 Defence counsel as also learned APP and have carefully gone through the evidence recorded in the matter and perused the documents placed on record by the prosecution in this case.
11. In my opinion the prosecution has not been able to bring home the guilt against the accused.
12. The star/material witness of the prosecution story i.e. the complainant Bajrang Lal whose deposition was sine qua non for proving the charges against the accused could not be examined. Despite the fact that trial lasted for eight long years, prosecution has failed to bring this witness in the witness box. As per the prosecution story it was the complainant's property into which the accused trespassed and committed theft of copper weighing around 100 kgs. However, neither the trespass nor the alleged theft could be proved.
13. Apart from the said witness there is no other eye witness to alleged incident of trespass/theft as claimed by the prosecution. Though, recovery of copper is shown to have been effected from the accused, I have my serious doubts regarding the same. In fact, the story as claimed by the prosecution does not inspire confidence and it cannot be ruled out that the said articles were planted upon the accused. Reason for my above said conclusion are firstly, the police officials failed to join any public person during alleged arrest of the accused/seizure proceedings of the stolen articles though it was 6 claimed by PW1 that many public persons had gathered at the spot. Not only this they even failed to give the name of the secret informer who allegedly informed them about the theft/possession of stolen articles by the accused. Secondly, the prosecution failed to account for the alleged auto rickshaw in which the stolen articles was found. Though, the said auto rickshaw was released to one Manoj Kumar on superdari however, neither the auto rickshaw nor its owner was ever produced in the court during the trial. Even, it is not clear whether the accused was driving the auto rickshaw or sitting on the passenger seat who was driving the rickshaw and why he was not made a witness/his statement not recorded by the IO in the present case. It is not clear as to how and in what capacity the auto came into the possession of the accused persons. Further, I find no reasons why the complainant was not made a witness during the seizure of the stolen articles when as claimed by the prosecution, the complainant Bajrang Lal had lodged a theft complaint on the same date. This somehow creates suspicion and it appears that the complaint was lodged subsequent to the recovery and that the recovery was planted.
14. The claim that the accused committed theft by breaking the roof of the factory also seems highly improbable as it is almost impossible for a person to break open the roof and climbed the same while carrying around 100 kgs of weight on his shoulder. No photographs of the spot were taken showing the broken roof of the factory to substantiate their claim.
715. As I have discussed above that the complainant was not examined, apart from non-examination of the complainant there is no document on record i.e. no sale receipt, invoice etc to show that the recovered articles ever belong to the complainant Bajrang Lal. No TIP of the goods were conducted to connect the complainant with the recovered articles.
16 Apart from this there are many other discrepancies in the prosecution story e.g. the IO claimed that the copper weighed around 70 Kgs. however, as per the complaint and the actual weight the copper weighed around 100 Kgs. Similarly though, PW1 stated that the recovered articles were lying in four kattas the IO stated that the Kattas were lying in 5 Jute Bags. These discrepancies in the absence of public witness, complainant and the other relevant facts as discussed above assumed great importance and benefit needs to be given to the accused persons.
17. So the prosecution has not only failed to connect the accused with the accident it has further failed to proved the negligence on the part of the accused.
18. Prosecution case may be true but criminal jurisprudence says that prosecution case must be true. There is a long distance between "may be true" and "must be true".
19. It is cardinal principle of criminal jurisprudence that an 8 accused is presumed to be innocent. The burden lies on the prosecution to prove the guilt of accused beyond reasonable doubt. The prosecution is under a legal obligation to prove each and every ingredient of offence beyond any doubt, unless otherwise so provided by any statute. This general burden never shifts, it always rests on the prosecution. (Daya Ram v. State of Haryana, (P&H)(DB) ,1997(1) R.C.R.(Criminal) 662).
20. In a criminal trial, the burden of proving everything essential to the establishment of the charge against an accused always rests on the prosecution and there is a presumption of innocence in favour of the accused until the contrary is proved. Criminality is not to be presumed, subject of course to some statutory exceptions.
21. In the present case prosecution has failed to discharge its onus. Accordingly, accused Ved Singh is entitled to acquittal.
I order accordingly.
Announced in the open (Gaurav Rao) Court on 08.10.2009 MM (W)/Delhi. 08.10.2009. 9 F.I.R. No: 873/96 U/s 457/380 IPC P.S. NANGLOI Pr: Ld. APP for state.
Accused produced from JC along with counsel Sh. S.B. Shaily from Legal Aid.
Final arguments heard. Put up for orders at 4:00 p.m. At 4:00 p.m. Vide my separate judgment the accused has been acquitted for the charges in the present matter.
Bail bond cancelled, surety discharged, endorsement if any be cancelled, original documents if any be returned as per rules and procedure.
File be consigned to Record Room.
(Gaurav Rao) MM (W)/Delhi.
08.10.2009