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8. In pursuance of the aforesaid conspiracy the appellants were said to have committed several acts of cheating, forgery and using of forged documents as genuine. But specific charges for these offences against each of the appellants were limited to only three in number. Evidence regarding the other acts of similar nature was treated merely as evidence under Section 10 of the Evidence Act proving the existence of conspiracy.

9. The specific charges related to the Travelling Allowances drawn in the names P. W. 9 Nirmal Ratan Sarkar, P. W. 14 Sitaram Routh. P. W. 15, Ramkishan Routh, P. W. 30 Ashim Kumar Bhaduri and one J. N. Das. This last named person could not be examined as according to the prosecution there was no such person In the Railway Protection Police at Sealdah.

17. The prosecution examined in all 47 witnesses. The specific charges of cheating, forgery and use of forged documents, as already stated, related to the T. A. Bills in the names of Sitaram Routh, Ram Krishan Routh, Nirmal Ratan Sarkar, Ashim Kumar Bhaduri and J. N. Das. All of them, except J. N. Das, were examined by the prosecution.

18. Nirmal Ratan Sarkar, P. W. 9 and Ashim K. Bhaduri, P. W. 30 said that at the relevant time they were under training and that hence they had not to do any "Line duty." They, therefore, had no occasion to claim any Travelling Allowance. Sitaram Routh, P. W. 14 and Ram Krishna Routh P. W. 15 said that they were mere Sweepers; that they were never sent out on "Line duty" and that they had never claimed nor drawn any travelling allowance.

27. The learned Judge further held that whatever other short-comings there might be in the prosecution evidence the fact that the acquittances in the T. A. Bills were forged was clearly proved, by the expert opinion. The false thumb-impressions were put by either Atlanta or Nagendra Prosad and Ram Rai and Mangal Singh attested them as genuine. From this the learned Judge concluded that both sets of accused were actuated by the common intention to forge, and necessarily also to cheat, as forgery was merely a means to achieve the object of cheating. He found Ananta and Ram Raj guilty on all the counts. Apart from the common charge of conspiracy they were charged with the offences of cheating, forgery and using of forged documents as genuine in respect of the T. A. Bills of Sitaram Routh, Asim Kumar Bhaduri and J. N. Das. Of these three, the last named person was not examined by the prosecution. Hence the trial Judge held that the charges of cheating, forgery and using of forged documents as genuine in so far as the T. A. Bill of J. N. Das was concerned were not proved. This was the reason why the conviction of these two accused were on a lesser number of counts as compared with the other two.

28. The common ground In all the three appeals was that no case of cheating or forgery was established by the facts proved and that there was no evidence of conspiracy. Apart from this common ground on merits some specific points more or less of a technical nature were also raised by the lawyers representing the different sets of appellants.

29. Mr. Chintaharan Roy appearing for Ram Rai Singh in Appeal 234 of 1962 contended in the first place that the trial was bad inasmuch as the order recording the taking of cognizance by the Special Court was vague. He pointed out that the Judge had in his order No. 1 referred to the petition of complaint filed by the Investigating Officer and also other papers as the materials upon which cognizance was taken by him. Mr. Ray contended that the Judge should have stated specifically what those other papers were. Now, this was a case where cognizance bad been taken prior to the amendment of Section 5 (1) of the West Bengal Criminal Law Amendment (Special Courts) Act 1949. The Full Bench in Ajit Kumar Palit's case, (FB) held that prior to the amendment the order of allotment, or if it did not contain sufficient details of the case, any material on the record, was sufficient for taking cognizance by the Special Court, This view was upheld by the Supreme Court in its decision . So the complaint filed by the Investigating Officer Would, by itself, have been quite sufficient for the Judge for taking cognizance and that being the position it mattered little whether or not he had taken into consideration any additional material or if taken into consideration what the material was. There is, therefore, no substance in this contention of Mr. Ray,