Calcutta High Court (Appellete Side)
Ranajit Mazumdar vs The State Of West Bengal on 11 October, 2018
1 In The High Court At Calcutta Criminal Miscellaneous Jurisdiction 11.10.18 CRM 9018 of 2018 Ranajit Mazumdar
-vs-
The State of West Bengal Mr. Milan Mukherjee Mr. Tirthankar Ghosh Mr. Brajesh Jha Mr. Prasenjit Debnath Ms. Punam Basu Ms. Sonam Basu Mr. Tarun Jyoti Tiwari ... for the petitioner.
Mr. Kishore Datta, Ld A.G. Mr. S.G. Mukherjee, Ld P.P. Mr. Sudip Ghosh Ms. Anasuya Sinha ... for the State.
This is an application under Section 439 Cr.P.C. challenging the order dated September 27, 2018 passed by the learned Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate-I thereby rejecting the petitioner's prayer for bail in connection with Jorasanko Police Station Case No. 248 dated August 7, 2018 under Sections 120B/420 IPC, 1860.
It is submitted by Mr. Mukherjee that the accused/ petitioner is a senior citizen and permanent resident of the locality and is a social worker by profession. He is in custody for last twenty days on being arrested on September 14, 2018 on the allegation in the complaint that sometimes during 2017-2018, one Subrata Chatterjee, the State General Secretary Organization of BJP, West Bengal and other senior leaders of BJP & RSS hatched up a criminal conspiracy 2 with others and pursuant to the same induced several members of the public in collusion with different Government undertaking Oil Companies vis. IOCL, BPCL & HPCL, to arrange LPG dealerships from the said companies in lieu of some pecuniary gains amounting to few crores and thereby committed the alleged offence.
It is further submitted that the case has been instituted as a counter blast to several complaints lodged by him with different police stations against some persons for misappropriating and/or embezzling funds relating to "Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana" Scheme for a considerable period of time; and that during investigation the accused/petitioner has made himself available before the Investigating Officer as and when called for and as such it cannot be said that there is any chance of absconding by the accused/petitioner. It is also submitted that the petitioner has been falsely implicated in the instant case on the basis of some inadmissible evidence in order to cause harassment, insult, ignominy and to wreck vengeance on him, at the behest of the complainant and the investigating agency. Accordingly, the petitioner has prayed for his release on bail in connection with the case under reference on any condition.
Mr. Kishore Datta, learned Advocate General and Mr. Ayan Basu strongly objected to the grant of release on bail during the early stage of investigation and have invited my attention to various pages of the case diary i.e. page nos. 161,164,243,253,256 including the statements of some witnesses.
My attention is also invited at page 444, particular question no. 18. The question put was whether Mr. Ranajit Mazumdar sent various e-mail 3 communications to the member of the public by seeking names and phone numbers/contact details of candidates for the locations LPG distributorship in different parts of West Bengal in the year 2017-2018 prior to the advertisement brought out by the oil companies i.e. IOCL, BPCL & HPCL in the daily newspapers on August 31, 2017. Whether Mr. Mazumdar was legally entitled to send such e-mails communications to the members of the public prior to the advertisement? The answer to query made was given by the witness, a retired G.M. LPG. IOCL that one was not entitled to send communications i.e. e-mails prior to the advertisement brought out by the oil companies i.e. IOCL, BPCL & HPCL in the daily newspapers on August 31, 2017. However, the oil companies was exclusively entitled for the publication in the newspapers as well as in the website of the oil companies.
Having regard to the materials placed on the case diary at the primary stage of investigation, prayer for bail is refused in the interest of investigation.
Accordingly, CRM 9018 of 2018 is dismissed.
sh ( Shivakant Prasad, J.)