minal Appeal No 226 of 1960
Appeal by special leave from the judgment and order dated July 28 1960 of the Madhya Pradesh High Court in Criminal Appeal No 385 of 1959
A R Choubay and Naunit Lal for the appellant
I N Shroff for the respondent
April 23
The judgment of the Court was delivered by RAGHUBAR DAYAL J
This appeal by special leave is directed against the order of the High Court of Madhya Pradesh reversing on State appeal the order of the Additional Sessions judge Hoshangabad acquiring the appellant and convicting him of an offence under section 414 I PC Five bales containing woollen shawls and mufflers despatched from Kanpur by the British India Corporation Ltd Kanpur Woollen Mills Branch Kanpur and another bale despatched from 291 Haimanpur to Kanpur were loaded at Itarsi railway station on September 18 1957 in Wagoa No CR 325
The lock of the wagon wag found broken open at Pandhurna Railway Station at about 100 am on September 20 1957
on checking at Nagpur the aforesaid bales were found missing
One of the bales despatched from Kanpur was found lying the next morning near the railway line between railway stations Jaulkheda and Multai
On September 23 1957 the house of one Gopi Nath at Multai was searched and certain articles including some torn labels were recovered from that house
The same day the police found the appellant and a few other persons come out of Gopi Nath s house at Betul whose front door was locked
Subsequently these persons were taken to the police station where the appellant made a statement showing readiness to point out the stolen property
At his instance the police recovered from different places of that house woollen shawls mufflers bed sheets and certain house breaking implements
These recoveries were made on September 23 and 24
As a result of investigation six persons were put on trial in the Magistrate s Court
Ajendra Nath appellant was charged under sections 120 B 379 and 414 IPC Babu Ram was charged under sections 120 B and 379 IPC Ram Prasad and Gyarsi were charged under section 120 B read with section 879 IPC Gopinath under section 120 B read with section 414 IPC and Birendranath under section 414 IPC
The learned Magistrate acquitted Birendra Nath and convicted the other accused of the offence under section 120 B read with section 379 IPC except in the case of Gopinath who was convicted of the offence under section 120 B read with section 414 IPC Ajendra Nath was also convicted of the offence tinder section 414 IPC 292 On appeal the learned Additional Sessions judge Hoshangabad acquitted all these convicted persons
He held that the property recovered was not proved to be stolen property and that the alleged conspiracy was not proved
The State filed an appeal against the acquittal of Gopinath and Ajendra Nath
The High Court dismissed the appeal against Gopinath and the appeal against Ajendra Nath for the offence of conspiracy
It however allowed the appeal against Ajendra Nath with respect to the offence under section 414 IPC
It is against this order that this appeal has been filed by Ajendra Nath appellant
Ajendra Nath did not question the recovery of the various articles from Gopi Nath s house at Betul at his instance
He did not claim the property to be his own but stated that it was not stolen property
The main contention for the appellant in this Court has been that these recovered article were not proved to be stolen property
Tile articles consisted of those said to have been sent by the British India Corporation Ltd Kanpur Woollen Mills Branch Kanpur and bed sheets sent by the firm of VSNC Narsingha Chettiar which carries on business of wholesale Hand Loom Cloth at Karur
The invoices relating to the four bales sent by  the Kanpur Woollen Mills give the details of the shawls and mufflers the bales contained
A very large quantity of these has been recovered
Out of 95 shawls and 63 mufflers as many as 80 shawls and 43 mufflers had been recovered
Similarly out of 10 pairs of bed sheets stolen 8 pairs have been recovered
The absence of any adequate explan ation for the presence of such a large quantity of articles similar to those proved to have been despatched by the Kanpur Woollen Mills or by the Karur company the recovery of these articles within 293 a few days of the theft the presence of silk and paper labels of Kanpur Woollen Mills on most of the shawls and mufflers recovered and of certain manuscript writings on the labels of the bed sheets by PW 24 Krishnamurthi brother of PW 16 Venkat Raman who does the Karur business have been taken into consideration by the High Court for coming to the finding that the property recovered was proved to be stolen property
These circumstances cannot be said to be such which would not justify the finding arrived at
The main contention for the appellant however is that it has not been definitely established from the evidence of Kunzru P W 10 that the shawls mufflers recovered were manufactured by the Kanpur Woollen Mills and were despatched in the bales which were subsequently stolen
Kunzru s evidence does fall short of establishing that the shawls and mufflers recovered were manufactured by the Kanpur Woollen Mills
He has not identified the recovered shawls and mufflers as those manufactured by these mills
In fact he was not even shown all the shawls and mufflers recovered
He was shown by the Police Inspector Government Railway Police two lois two shawls and two mufflers
He got them examined by the textile expert and on the report of the expert gave the certificate that they appeared to be manufactured by the Woollen Mills of Kanpur
That expert has not been examined in Court and therefore Kunzru s statement alone fails to establish that these shawls and mufflers were manufactured by these mills
However it is not open to doubt that they were manufactured by these mills when most of them had sewn silk labels of these mills and quite a good number of them had even paper labels indicating that they were manufactured by these mills
There is no reason to suppose and in fact no such suggestion has been made that these labels had been put on these articles by some one for the purpose of 294 deception
We therefore consider that the finding that these shawls and mufflers were the manufacture of Kanpur Woollen Mills is correct
It was also contended for the appellant that it was not proved that these shawls and mufflers were in the bales which were despatched by the Kanpur Woollen Mills and that the gate passes and the invoices produced by Kunzru were not proved as persons who wrote them had not been examined
Kunzru produced the originals of these documents
He is the salesman of the Kanpur Woollen Mills
His cross examination in no way indicates that his statement about the genuineness of the invoices and gate passes was questioned in cross examination
There is nothing to suppose that the invoices and gate passes produced in Court did not correctly represent the articles placed inside particular bales to which specific numbers were given and that those bales were despatched from the Mills in accordance with the gate passes
In this connection reference was made to the fact that five of the shawls recovered were of violet colour and no shawl of such a colour was mentioned in any of the invoices
There can be a possibility of a misdescription in the invoices There can be a possibility of the violet shawls being the property stolen in some other incident
The fact remains that even the violet shawls are not claimed by the appellant as his own
So we do not consider any force in this contention for considering the finding of the High Court defective about the property recovered to be stolen property
With respect to the identity of the bed sheets there is the evidence of PWs 16 and 24
PW 16 deposed that he had supplied 10 pairs of bed sheets to a certain customer who disowned the bale
Thereupon he asked the Station Master Ahimanpur to return the parcel to Karur
He recognized the various sheets to be of his firm which they had 295 despatched to Ahimanpur
He further deposed that before despatching the goods they paste the firm labels on them
He stated that his younger brother Krishna Murti had noted size number and pattern over these sheets in his handwriting as he happened to be at home on vacation
Krishna Murti PW24 admits that certain labels on the bed sheets were in his hand writing that he wrote them under instructions of his brother and that he had not written sirnilar numbers on any other bed sheets
He however stated subsequently that he did such type of markings casually on occasions and that the Sub Inspector had also got him write the size pattern etc on certain other blank labels of the shop as well
The learned Additional Sessions judge did not rely on these statements and felt that the Investigating Officer might have got those markings on the labels of the recovered articles during the investigation
The High Court thought that there was no reason for doubting the correctness of the statements of these witnesses and for suspecting that the writings on the labels were obtained during the investigation
No question was put to PW 24 about the police making him write on the labels on the recovered articles
In fact according to the witness labels with his writings were shown to him for purposes of recognition and he recognized those writings to be his
The police took his writings on blank labels for purposes of comparison
We therefore see no good reason for considering the finding of the High Court with respect to the bed sheets recovered to be stolen property to be wrong
It was also contended that it was not open to the High Court to record a finding about the recovered property to be stolen property when the Government had not appealed against the other co accused who were acquitted on the basis of the finding that the property recovered was not proved to be stolen 296 property
We do not see any force in this contention
The mere fact that the learned Additional Sessions judge acquitted the other accused on the ground that the property recovered was not proved to be stolen property did not preclude the State from appealing against the acquittal of the appellant against whom there is better evidence for establishing that he was in possession of the stolen property than the evidence was against the other co accused
The State could challenge the correctness of the findings of the learned Additional Sessions judge about the property being stolen property and consequently the High Court can record its own finding on that question
Lastly it was also urged that even if the identity of the articles recovered with the articles stolen be established no offence under s414 IPC is made out against the appellant as the other accused have been acquitted and it is not known whom the appellant is supposed to have helped in concealing the stolen property
Section 414 IPC makes it an offence for a person to assist voluntarily in stealing or disposing of or making away with property which he knows or has reason to believe to be stolen property
It is not necessary for a person to be convicted under s414 IPC that another person must be traced out and convicted of an offence of committing theft
The prosecution has simply to establish that the property recovered is stolen property and that the appellant provided help in its concealment and disposal
The circumstances of the recovery sufficiently make out that the property was deliberately divided into different packets and was separately kept
May be that the property failing to the share of a particular thief was kept separately
It was recovered from several different places in the same house
These places included an iron safe and an underground cellar
The evening before several persons including the appellant were found to be coming out of the back door of the house which had its front door 297 locked
The appellant also knew the whereabouts of the property inside the house of his maternal grandfather
He attempted to sell a few mufflers a day before the recoveries were made
He was seen arriving at the house during the night in a car with some persons and then removing property which looked like bales from the car to the house
All these circumanstances go to support the finding that he had assisted in the concealment of the stolen property and had thus committed the offence under s414 IPC We therefore see no force in this appeal and accordingly dismiss it
Appeal dismissed


Summary:
Five bales containing woollen shawls and mufflers dispatched from Kanpur by the British India Corporation Ltd and another bale despatched from Haimanpur to Kanpur were loaded in wagon at Itarsi railway station
The lock of the wagon was found broken open and on checking at nagpur the aforesaid bales were found missing
On search certain articles including some torn labels were recovered from the house of one Gopinath
The same day the appellant and few other persons were found by the Policecoming out of Gopinath s house whose front door was locked
They were taken to the Police Station and at the instance of the appellant the police recovered woollen shawls mufflers bed sheets and certain house breaking implements from different places of that house
After investigation six persons including the appellant were put on trial before the Magistrate for several charges under sections 120 B 379 and 414 of the Indian Penal Code and except one Birendra Nath all were convicted
On appeal all the convicted persons were acquitted by the Additional Sessions Judge on further appeal by the State against the acquittal of Gopinath and the appellant the High Court allowed the appeal only against the appellant with respect to the offence under section 414 of the Indian Penal Code
On appeal by special leave this Court held  Held that the mere fact that the other accused persons were acquitted on the ground that the property recovered was not proved to be stolen property did not preclude the State from appealing against the acquittal of the appellant against 290 whom there is better evidence
The State could challenge the correctness of the findings of the Additional Sessions Judge about the property being stolen property and the High Court could record its own findings on that question
Held further that it is not necessary for a person to be convicted under section 414 Indian Penal Code that another person must be traced out and convicted of an offence of committing theft
The prosecution has simply to establish that the property recovered is stolen property and that the appellant provided help in its concealment and disposal
The circum stances of the recovery in the present case sufficiently prove that the appellant had assisted in the concealment of the stolen property and had thus committed the offence under section 414 Indian Penal Code
The appeal therefore must be dismissed