Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 – s.8(c) r/w. s.20(b)(ii)(c) – Prosecution case that PW-1-Inspector and team members intercepted a vehicle and A-1 and A-2 were present in the vehicle – It was alleged that three bundles of ganja weighing around 80 kgs found lying in the vehicle were seized in the presence of PW-1 and the panchas – A-1 and A-2 were arrested on the spot and interrogated – Acting on their interrogation/confession, A-3 and A-4 were arrested – Propriety: Held: A perusal of the evidence of the Seizure Officer (Inspector PW1) and the confession-cum-seizure panchnama (Exhibit P-3) would reveal that the prosecution claims to have recovered the contraband from three bags wherein the ganja as well as green chillies were present – Seizure Officer(Inspector PW-1) made no effort whatsoever to conduct a separate weighment of the contraband by segregating the chillies – Rather, the panchnama is totally silent about presence of chillies with the bundles of ganja – When PW-5-Investigating officer appeared for deposition, he produced the muddamal ganja in the Court and it was seen that the same was packed in seven new bags as against the three bags referred to in the seizure memo (Exhibit P-3) – Neither any proceedings were conducted nor any memo was prepared by the police officers for repacking the seized ganja bundles in new packaging – Two independent panchas were not examined – LW-10, who prepared three samples of ganja as per PW-5 was also not examined – In addition thereto, the prosecution neither examined any witness nor produced any document to satisfy the Court regarding safe keeping of the samples right from the time of the seizure till the same reached the FSL – No proceedings u/s. 52A were undertaken by the Investigating officer for preparing inventory and obtaining samples in presence of jurisdictional Magistrate – As far as A-3 and A-4 are concerned, it is not the case of the prosecution that the accused A-3 and A-4 were found in possession of ganja – The entire case of the prosecution as against these two accused is based on the interrogation notes of A-1 and A-2 – It is trite that confession of an accused recorded by a Police Officer is not admissible in evidence as the same is hit by Section 25 of the Evidence Act – The evidence of the police witnesses is full of contradictions and is thoroughly unconvincing – The conviction of the accused appellants as recorded by the trial Court and affirmed by the High Court is illegal on the face of record and suffers from highest degree of perversity. [Paras 19-24]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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