1 sns IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION CRIMINAL APPLICATION NO.417 OF 2010 in CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. OF 2009 C.B.I., ACB ..Applicant. v/s. Rajendra P. Saxena ..Respondent. Mr. Sandip Shinde, adv. for the Applicant. Mr. S.R.Delande i/by Shri V.N.Shingnapurkar, advs. for the respondent no. 1. Smt. G.P.Mulekar, APP for the State. CORAM : J.H.BHATIA, J. DATE : 14th September, 2011 PC : 1 The application is moved by the CBI seeking leave to prefer appeal against the order of acquittal passed by the learned Special Judge under the Prevention of Corruption Act in CBI Special Case No.14/2003. 2 Heard the learned counsel for the parties. 3 The complainant, who had retired as a chief engineer Central Railway, started his construction company after retirement. He had some disputes with the Railways about his claim and that claim was referred to the Arbitral Tribunal consisting of three members including accused/respondent. The accused was also chief engineer with Railways and was acting as a Chief Arbitrator in the Arbitral Tribunal. According to the 2 sns complainant to give award favourable to him, the accused had made demand of Rs.50,000/- and, therefore, the complainant approached the CBI. After completing the formalities, raid was arranged and the accused had allegedly accepted envelope containing tainted notes of Rs.50,000/- in his chamber. The trial Court minutely scanned the prosecution evidence and particularly the evidence of the complainant in paragraph 22 of the judgment. No panch witness was present at the time of his verification statement in the office of CBI. In spite of instructions given in pre-raid panchanama and availability of two panch witnesses, the complainant entered into the chamber of the accused without taking any panch witness with him. He admitted that he never wanted the panch witnesses to accompany him when he wanted to meet accused in his chamber. Thus, the complainant wanted to keep away the panch witnesses at the time of verification as well as at the time of raid. As no panch witness was present, independent evidence about the happenings in the chamber of the accused at the time of raid was not available. Record of what had happened at the time of raid was based on the information given by the complainant himself. In his evidence, the complainant admitted that when he entered into the chamber of the accused, the accused was not present in his chamber as he had gone to his antechamber for bringing some files 3 sns pertaining to arbitration cases. According to the accused, in his absence, the envelope containing tainted notes were planted in his brief-case. According to the accused, when he was asked to open the brief-case, he opened it and when he took out that packet , his hand got tainted with the powder. The trial Court noted that according to the complainant, he had put the envelope on the table as per the instructions given by the accused and then the accused had lifted the envelope and put it into the brief-case. However, the I.O. did not make any attempt to collect the traces of the powder from the table, which could provide corroboration to the evidence of the complainant. After considering these grounds , the learned Special Judge found that evidence of the complainant is not reliable and acquitted the accused. 4 It is settled position of law that the appellate Court will not interfere in the order of acquittal merely because two different views are possible. If both the views are reasonably possible, the appellate Court will not interfere in the view taken by the trial Court. The appellate Court will not interfere in the order of acquittal unless the appellate Court finds that the order of the trial Court is either perverse or per-se wrong or against the facts. Taking into consideration the facts of the present case and the reasons given by the trial Court, the view taken by the trial Court appears to be correct and reasonably possible. Therefore, I do not see any valid 4 sns reason to grant leave to prefer appeal. 5 In the result, leave to prefer appeal is hereby refused and the application stands rejected. (J.H.BHATIA, J.)