Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 – ss. 7 and 13(1)(d) r/w 13(2) – Demand and acceptance of illegal gratification – Prosecution case that the the appellant-Forest Section Officer and the co-accused-Forest guard demanded and accepted bribe from the complainant who operated a sawmill – Complaint filed by the complainant to the DySP, alleging that the flying squad led by the appellant imposed a fine of Rs.50,000/- on his saw mill in relation to the recovery of illegal and unlicensed teakwood in the saw-mill – Next week, the appellant and the Forest guard again demanded a monthly amount of Rs.5,000/- to refrain from taking any further action on the saw-mill – DySP organized the pre-trap proceedings, wherein the appellant demanded and accepted the bribe amount from the complainant – Conviction and sentence of the appellant and the co-accused u/ss. 7 and 13(1)(d) r/w 13(2) by the trial court – High Court acquitted the co-accused whereas upheld the order as regards the appellant – Correctness: Held: Grave suspicion on the prosecution case that the appellant demanded the bribe money from the complainant – Prosecution miserably failed to prove the factum of demand of bribe against the appellant by reliable direct or circumstantial evidence – Allegation regarding acceptance of bribe by the appellant is primarily based on the evidence of the complainant, PW-2 and DySP whereas the complainant and PW-2 being close friends, it can safely be assumed that PW-2 was an interested witness – No satisfactory evidence on record to establish that the appellant had actually handled the tainted currency notes as claimed by the complainant – No justification for the DySP to have straight away register the FIR on the mere ipse dixit of the complainant and to have planned the trap proceedings without the minimum endeavour to verify the background facts leading to the alleged demand of bribe – Prudent and unbiased police officer would be persuaded to make at least a basic enquiry into these facts rather than following the dictat of the complainant – Furthermore, PW-2 was the only witness associated by the DySP to accompany the complainant for witnessing the transaction of demand and acceptance of bribe – PW-2 was kept as a shadow witness in the case – DySP did not make any effort whatsoever to associate an independent person to act as a shadow witness in the trap proceedings – Also call detail records completely demolish the complainant’s case – Manner in which the worker in the saw mill was associated as a panch witness in the trap proceedings, creates a grave doubt that the entire case was orchestrated against the appellant at the instance of the worker – Prosecution case full of embellishments contradicting and doubting and thus, would not be safe to convict the appellant for having demanded and accepted the bribe money from the complainant – Prosecution failed to bring home the charges against the appellant by leading evidence of an unimpeachable character – Appellant to be acquitted of the charges – Impugned judgments quashed and set aside. [Paras 48, 52-57]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Headnotes prepared by: Nidhi Jain. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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