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―56. Grant of pardon under Section 306 Cr.P.C. would not fall within the purview of the words 'finally absolved by a Court of competent jurisdiction owing to an order of discharge, acquittal or because of quashing of the scheduled offence against him' used by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Vijay Madanlal Chaudhary (Supra). The pardon granted under Section 306 Cr.P.C. to a person in a scheduled offence would not ipso facto result in his acquittal in the offence under the PMLA, unless, of course, the accused person seeks pardon in the case under PMLA also by making a full and true disclosure of the whole of the circumstances within his knowledge relative to the offence under PMLA also.‖

14. Learned Special Counsel also drew the attention of this Court to the judgment of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in State (Delhi Administration) v. Jagjit Singh, 1989 Supp (2) SCC 770, to demonstrate that the person, who has been granted status of approver under Section 306 of the Cr.P.C. would be legally bound to answer any question which is relevant to the case in which he has become an approver even if the answer to such a question is likely to incriminate him directly or indirectly. It was submitted that proviso to Section 132 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 (for short ‗IEA'), expressly provides that such an answer given by a witness shall not subject him to any arrest or prosecution and nor the same can be proved against him in any criminal proceedings except for a prosecution for giving false evidence by such answer.

after the detailed analysis of the precedents has observed and held as under: -
―56. Grant of pardon under Section 306 Cr.P.C. would not fall within the purview of the words 'finally absolved by a Court of competent jurisdiction owing to an order of discharge, acquittal or because of quashing of the scheduled offence against him' used by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Vijay Madanlal Chaudhary (Supra). The pardon granted under Section 306 Cr.P.C. to a person in a scheduled offence would not ipso facto result in his acquittal in the offence under the PMLA, unless, of course, the accused person seeks pardon in the case under PMLA also by making a full and true 18:16:53 disclosure of the whole of the circumstances within his knowledge relative to the offence under PMLA also.‖ SLP against the said judgment has been dismissed as withdrawn by Hon'ble Supreme Court vide order dated 28.11.2023 in SLP (Crl.) No. 12870/2023.

19. In any case, since the present applicant has been granted pardon in the scheduled/predicate offences, the evidence sought to be given at his instance in those proceedings cannot be used for the purposes of present proceedings under the PMLA. Even in the scheduled/predicate offence the status of the present applicant remains as a witness subject to his full and complete disclosure in terms of the Section 308 of the CrPC. This Court agrees with the judgment given by the learned Single-Judge of Allahabad High Court in Mohan Lal Rathi (supra), that the grant of pardon would bring an accused in the category of witness however, the same, as pointed out hereinabove, is subject to certain conditions enshrined under Sections 306 and 307 of the CrPC and cannot be considered as absolute absolvement in the predicate offence.