Allahabad High Court
Ram Prakash Chaddha vs State Of U.P. on 21 April, 2023
Author: Shekhar Kumar Yadav
Bench: Shekhar Kumar Yadav
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD ?Court No. - 70 Case :- APPLICATION U/S 482 No. - 21739 of 2007 Applicant :- Ram Prakash Chaddha Opposite Party :- State of U.P. Counsel for Applicant :- Samit Gopal,Anuj Srivastava,Vipin Kumar Counsel for Opposite Party :- Govt. Advocate Hon'ble Shekhar Kumar Yadav,J.
Heard learned counsel for the applicant, learned AGA for the State and perused the record.
This application is directed against the order dated 19.4.2007 passed by the Add. Sessions Judge, (CBI) Prevention of Corruption Act, UP East Ghaziabad, whereby the application dated 4.4.2007 under Section 227 Cr.P.C. has been rejected.
Record discloses that initially an FIR vide Case Crime No. 351 of 1993 under Section 392 IPC was lodged by the applicant at P.S. Modi Nagar, District Ghaziabad alleging therein that cashier of applicant, namely, Ramkishore and one Pappu Yadav went to pick-up money in the morning of 15-7-93 from Ghaziabad to Meerut in a Van. It is also alleged that after collecting money from Meerut they have also to visit Modinagar. It is further alleged that while returning from Meerut at around 5-15 pm, when they stopped the car in front of Ginni Devi School in Modinagar to pick up money from the shop of Poonam's sales, the cashier, namely, Ramkishore got down from the car and went towards the alleged shop and another person Pappu Yadav was sitting in the car with the cash in a bag, and at that time two persons came and snatched the cash at pistol point and ran away on a motorcycle. It is alleged that in the bag total Rs.125000/- were in cash along with some other documents. It is further alleged that thereafter the incident was reported to the cashier by Pappu Yadav. The police started investigation and took the cashier from the place of the applicant on 17/7/1993 to Modi Nagar Station and he was in the custody of police till 23/24/7/1993.
It appears that the said cashier thereafter died, regarding which an FIR was lodged on 24.7.1993 by the applicant vide Case Crime No. 371 of 1993, under Section 302 IPC at P.S. Modi Nagar, District Ghaziabad in connection with an incident alleged to have taken place on unknown date and time. Thereafter the matter was subsequently handed over the to CBCID, UP Lucknow for investigation and charge sheet was submitted on 21.02.2000 against the applicant and two other co accused persons. It is further contended that from the evidence collected during investigation the only allegations against the applicant is that when the police came to the shop of the applicant to interrogate the cashier, the applicant handed over him to the police of P.S. Modi Nagar. Subsequently, an application dated 4.4.2007 under Section 227 Cr.P.C. filed by the applicant before the trial court on the ground that there is no evidence against the applicant to connect him with the alleged incident, which has been rejected by the court below. It is this order which is subject matter of challenge before this court.
It is contended by learned counsel for the applicant the whole prosecution allegations against the applicant is that his money was subjected to theft regarding which earlier he lodged an FIR and handed over the deceased to the police. He further submitted that handing over the suspected culprit to the police was a legal act of the applicant and therefore no offence as alleged is made out against the applicant. It is further submitted that taking all the material contained in the case diary as it is without any addition or subtraction no offence at all whatsoever is made out and the prayer for discharge has been wrongly rejected by the trial court. He further submitted that the impugned order rejecting the application for discharge is wholly illegal, capricious and against weight of evidence on record. He has further submitted that it transpires that order has been passed illegally in a routine manner and without application of judicial mind, hence without considering nature of evidence on record and therefore, the same are liable to be quashed.
On the contrary, learned AGA vehemently opposed the application and contended that that if on the basis of material on record the court could form an opinion that the accused might have committed offence it can frame the charge, though for conviction the conclusion is required to be proved beyond reasonable doubt that the accused has committed the offence. At the time of framing of the charges the probative value of the material on record cannot be gone into, and the material brought on record by the prosecution has to be accepted as true at that stage.
Indisputably, it is open to this Court to quash the charges framed by the trial court and discharge the accused applicant but the same cannot be done by weighing the correctness, sufficiency of the evidence. The principle to be adopted in such cases should be that if the entire evidence produced by the prosecution is to be believed would it constitute the offence or not. It is only at the stage of the trial that truthfulness, sufficiency and acceptability of the evidence can be adjudged. Therefore, it will not be proper to truncate or snip the proceeding at the stage of framing of charges against the applicant. The impugned order passed by the court below is well in conformity in law and does not suffer from error of illegality, irregularity and warrant no interference by this Court.
Thus, in the case in hand, the court below has rightly dismissed the argument for discharge of applicant. There is no illegality, perversity or impropriety in the impugned order. There is no jurisdictional error in the impugned order. The application has no force and is hereby dismissed.
Office is directed to certify the copy of this order to the court below through learned Sessions Judge, Ghaziabad.
Order Date :- 21.4.2023 RavindraKSingh