Crl. Revn. No. 3237 of 2010(O&M) -1- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Crl. Revn. No. 3237 of 2010(O&M) Date of Decision: December 07, 2010 Vinod Kumar ......Petitioner Versus State of Punjab ......Respondent CORAM : HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE MEHINDER SINGH SULLAR Present: Mr. Deepak Arora, Advocate for the petitioner. M ehinder S ingh S ullar , J (Oral) . The compendium of facts, which needs a necessary mention, for a limited purpose of deciding the core controversy involved in the instant petition and emanating from the record is that petitioner-convict Vinod Kumar son of Gurcharan Dass (herein after referred to as 'the petitioner) was posted and working as a Registration Clerk in the Tehsil office, at the relevant time. He collected the huge amount but did not deposit the amount of Registration fee in the Treasury. Thus, he embezzled an amount of Rs.1,74,449/- in lieu of Registration Fee which was collected by him, at the time of registration of documents. On the basis of aforesaid allegations and in the wake of the complaint/letter of Deputy Commissioner, Gurdaspur, the present case was registered against the petitioner, vide FIR No. 89 dated 29.08.2001, on accusation of having committed the offence punishable under Section 409 of IPC by police of Police Station Kalanaur, District Gurdaspur, in the manner indicated here-in- above. 2. Having completed all the codal formalities and on ultimate analysis of oral as well as documentary evidence brought on record by the prosecution, the Crl. Revn. No. 3237 of 2010(O&M) -2- trial Court convicted and sentenced the petitioner to undergo rigorous imprisonment for a period of two years, to pay a fine of Rs.100/- and in default of payment of fine, to further undergo rigorous imprisonment for a period of 7 days, for the commission of offence punishable under Section 409 IPC, vide impugned judgment of conviction and order of sentence dated 24.05.2007. 3. Aggrieved by the impugned judgment of conviction and order of sentence, the petitioner filed the appeal, which was dismissed as well by the first appellate Court by virtue of impugned judgment dated 15.11.2010. 4. The petitioner still did not feel satisfied with the impugned judgments of the Courts below and filed the present revision petition 5. Having heard the learned counsel for the petitioner, going through the record with his valuable assistance and after deep consideration of the entire matter, to my mind, there is no merit in the instant revision petition. 6. Ex facie, the arguments of learned counsel, that the petitioner has been falsely implicated and there is no cogent evidence on record to prove his culpability for the offence punishable under Section 409 IPC and since the Courts below have wrongly convicted, so the petitioner deserves to be acquitted, are not only devoid of merit but misplaced as well. 7. As is evident from the record, that the prosecution has produced sufficient oral as well as documentary evidence on record to prove the guilt of the petitioner. Apart from other evidence, PW1- Sukhjinder Singh has proved the recovery memos Ex. PA and Ex. PB, vide which receipts and cash book Ex PD to Ex. PI were taken into possession by the police. PW-6 Subhash Chander proved the enquiry reports ExPW/6 and Ex.PW/5 wherein details of amounts which were collected by the petitioner and not deposited in the Treasury, are mentioned. Not only that, even the petitioner has refused to give his signatures for comparison. 8. Taking into consideration the entire oral as well as documentary evidence on record, the trial Court convicted and sentenced the petitioner in the Crl. Revn. No. 3237 of 2010(O&M) -3- manner indicated here-in-above. The First Appellate Court again re-examined and scrutinized the evidence and dismissed the appeal of the petitioner by way of the impugned judgment dated 15.11.2010, the operative part of which is as under:- “At the very out set it is to be noted that the accused has refused to give his signatures Ex. PW7/A. Hence, the learned lower court has taken adverse inference against the accused. I find that this was a right view taken by the learned lower court. If the accused was innocent person, he would have give his signatures for his comparison with the signatures on the cash book and on the receipts. By his denying to give his signatures, it makes clear that he is running away from the trial. Accordingly, adverse inference has rightly been drawn by the learned lower court. Now coming to this, it is clear that accused was posted as Registration Clerk with Naib Tehsildar Kalanaur from 30.11.1999 to 19.1.2000. It is his duty to collect registration fee and to deposit it in the bank after taking voucher from the Treasury. In order to prove this, the prosecution has lead ample evidence (PW1) is Sukhjinder Singh who has proved the recovery memo Ex. PA and Ex. PB vide which receipts and cash book Ex. PD to Ex. PI were taken into police possession, (PW 2) is Vijay Kumar who proved the appointment letter of the accused Ex. PJ, (PW3) is Devi Dayal who proved letter of DC Ex. PK for the registration of FIR, (PW 4) is Ajit Kumar, who proved posting of the accused as Registration Clerk at Kalanaur vide Ex. P.W.L, (PW 5) is Jagdish Chander who proved the sanction letter Ex. PW5/A under section 197 of the Cr.P.C., (PW 6) is Subhash Chander who proved the reports Ex. PW 6/A and Ex.PW 5/B, wherein there is detail of amounts not deposited by the accused, (PW7) is Ashwani Kumar Ahlmad who proved the refusal of the accused for giving his handwriting, (PW8) is SI Prem Singh IO who has proved the details of the investigation done by him. Finally Naib Tehsildar appeared who proved that accused was Registration Clerk who had not deposited the amount which was confirmed in the enquiry by Naib Tehsildar. Now going through the defence evidence, it is clear that (DW 1) is Amrik Singh. He in his cross examination has confirmed that Vinod Kumar accused has misappropriated Rs. 1,74,449/- pertaining to the registration fee. He further admitted that he was posted as Registration Clerk and it is duty of Registration Clerk to collect the fee and deposit it in the Treasury. In the enquiry done by Naib Tehsildar on 21.8.2001 Ex. PW 9/A, which clearly indicates and fix responsibility of the accused to deposit the collected amount or the registration fee in the bank. Crl. Revn. No. 3237 of 2010(O&M) -4- Now in the enquiry from the bank, the fact came into surface that amount was never deposited in the Bank. So, it is clear that the seals of the bank on the cash books were forged by the accused himself. The letter written by Deputy Commissioner, Gurdaspur to the SSP Batala in which directions were issued to register the case. In the report Ex.PW9/A the amount was entered in the cash book so tallied with the report of the treasury and State Bank of India and it was found that the amount collected from the registration fee between 2.12.1999 to 18.1.2000 has been entered in the cash book, but this amount is not telling the record of the treasury and the Bank. So, I find that the learned lower court has rightly come to the conclusion that the accused has misappropriated the amount of Rs.1,74,449/- collected by him as registration fee being a Government employee. Hence, the learned trial court has rightly passed the judgment of conviction against hi, which requires no interference. Accordingly, the appeal is dismissed.” 10. Meaning thereby, the Courts below have taken into consideration and appreciated the entire relevant evidence brought on record by the prosecution in the right perspective. Having scanned the oral as well as documentary evidence, the petitioner was rightly convicted and sentenced vide well articulated judgments of conviction by the Courts below. Such judgments cannot legally be set aside, while exercising the limited revisional jurisdiction of this Court as contemplated under Section 401 Cr.P.C., unless the same are perverse and without jurisdiction. No such patent illegality or legal infirmity has been pointed out by learned counsel for the petitioner, so as to take the contrary view then that of the well reasoned decision arrived at by the Courts below in this respect. Therefore, the contrary arguments of learned counsel for petitioner that there was no material on record to convict him 'stricto sensu' deserves to be and are hereby repelled and the impugned judgment is hereby maintained, in the obtaining circumstances of the case. 11. Faced with the situation, the learned counsel for petitioner urged hat since the petitioner is a first offender and is only bread earner, so, he be released on probation. To me, this contention cannot legally be accepted as imprisonment for life is provided for commission of offence under Section 409 IPC, for which Crl. Revn. No. 3237 of 2010(O&M) -5- the petitioner was convicted and sentenced. Therefore, even there is no scope for releasing him on probation as well. 12. No other legal point, worth consideration, has either been urged or pressed by learned counsel for the petitioner. 13. In the light of the aforesaid reasons as there is no merit, therefore, the revision petition is hereby dismissed, as such. (Mehinder Singh Sullar) Decemer 07, 2010 JUDGE G.Arora