ION Criminal Appeal No 237 of 1959
Appeal from the judgment and order dated February 10 and 11 of 1959 of the Bombay High Court in Criminal Appeal No 102359 with Crinal Appeals Nos 1048 and 1048 of 1958
H R Khanna and P D Menon for the appellant
section G Patwardhan
JB Dadachanji OC Mathur and Ravinder Narain for the respondent No 1 1962
January 23
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by RAGHUAR DAYAL J
This appeal on a certificate granted by the High Court of Bombay raises the question whether the contravention of the provisions of sub section
2 of section 222 of the Code of Criminal Procedure hereinafter called the Code in the framing of the charge against an accused vitiates the trial
The facts leading to the appeal in brief are as follows
The respondents were charged and tried at the same trial of the offences under section 120B read with section 406 IPC and of an offence under section 406 IPC and committed in pursuance of the criminal conspiracy they had entered into
They were also tried but acquitted of other offences charged with
They appealed against their conviction of the offence under section 120 B read with section 406 IPC and of the offence under section 406 IPC The charge under section 406 IPC was with respect to the commission of trust of trust of a sum of Rs 218369 between the period March 6
1949 and June 30 1950
It was contended before the High Court that the charge framed contravened the provisions of sub 713 section 2 of section 222 of the Code which allowed a combined charge with respect to the amount embezzled within a period of a year
The High Court agreed with this contention and holding the trial void set aside the conviction of the respondents and acquitted them of the offences
The High Court however maintained the order of acquittal is respect of the other offences
The State of Bombay now Maharashtra has filed this appeal against the order setting aside the conviction of the respondents
It is not necessary for us to determine in this appeal the general question whether the contravention of the provisions of sub R 2 of section 222 of the Code in the framing of the charge will always make the trial void as in this particular case the offence under section 406 IPC charged against the respondents was said to have been committed in pursuance of a criminal conspiracy entered into by them
It will therefore suffice for the purpose of this case to consider whether such a defect in the charge vitiates the present trial
Section 222 of the Code is one of the sections in Chapter XIX which deals with Form of Charges
Sections 221 222 and 223 deal with what should be mentioned in the charge
The whole object of the charge is inform both the prosecution and the accused particularly of the accusation the prosecution has to establish and the accused has to meet
So long as the accused knows fully what accusation he has to meet any error in the narrative of the charge need not be fatal to the trial
Sections 225 232 535 and 537 save the trial from being vitiated unless of course the accused has been prejudiced and failure of justice has taken place
Sections 233 to 239 deal with the joinder of charger and they speak not only of an accused being charged with offences but of such charges 714 being tried separately or jointly
Section 233 states that for every distinct offence of which any person is accused there shall be a separate charge and every such charge shall be tried separately except in the cases mentioned in sections 234 235 236 and 239
It is clear that the general rule is theat there should be a separate trial for each distinct offence of which a person is accused
It follows that each item of property of which an accused is alleged to have committed breach of trust constitutes one distance offence and that in general it would be necessary to have as many trials as there be distinct offences of criminal breach of trust committed by the accused
But section 2222 provides that when the accused is charged with criminal breach of trust the charge may be with respect to the gross sum embezzled within a period of one year and that the charged so framed shall be deemed to be a charge of one offence within the meaning of section 234
The charge framed in the present case was with respect to the gross sum embezzled within a period of more than twelve months the period being between March 6 1949 and June 30 1950
The charge therefore was in contravention of the provisions of section 2222
This defect in the charge however did not lead to any prejudice to the accused in the trial and therefore did not vitiate the trial in view of the provisions of section 537 of the Code
The charge could have been split up into two charges one with respect to the offence of criminal breach of trust committed with respect to the amount embezzled between March 6 1949 and March 5 1950 and the other with respect to the amount embezzled between March 6 1950 and June 30 1950
The two offences of criminal breach of trust could have been tried together in the present case as the offences were said to have been committed in pursuance of the criminal conspiracy entered into by the accused All the offences 715 committed in pursuance of the conspiracy are committed in the course of the same transaction and therefore can be tried together at one trial in view of sub section 1 of section 235 of the Code which provides that if in one series of acts so connected together as to form the same transaction more offences than one are committed by the same person he may be charged with and tried at one trial for every such offence
It is therefore clear that no prejudice was caused to the accused by the defect in the charge
A similar view has been taken by this Court in Kadiri Kundahammad vs The State of Madras 1
We may further point out that the High Court should not have expressed its opinion or passed any order with respect to the acquittal of the respondents for the other offences when the order of acquittal was not before it for consideration and when it had held the entire trial to be void on account of the contravention of the provisions of sub section
2 of section 222
We therefore hold that the trial of the respondents was legal and therefore allow the appeal and set aside the order of the High Court
Their appeal against their conviction has not been heard on merits and therefore we remand the case to the High Court for further hearing according to law


Summary:
The respondents were charged and tried at the same trial with the offences of Criminal conspiracy and breach of trust committed in pursuance thereof during a period of more than one year
The question arising for decision was whether in the framing of the charge contravention of the provisions of sub s2 of s222 which allowed a combined charge with respect to the amount embezzled within a period of one year vitiated the trial
 Held that the defect in the charge did not lead to any prejudice to the accused and therefore did not vitiate the trial in view of the provision of section 537 of the Code of Criminal Procedure
When all the offences committed in pursuance of a conspiracy are committed in course of the same transaction this can be tried together at one trial in view of section 2351 of the Code of Criminal Procedure which provides that if in one 712 series of acts so connected together as to form the same transaction more offences than one are committed by the same person he may be charged with and tried at one trial for every such offence
Kadiri Kanhahammad vs The State of Madrs AI R  followed