1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY NAGPUR BENCH, NAGPUR. CRI.APPLICATION NO.1568 OF 2007 (JAIDEV S. GURUDEV VS. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA & 2 OTH.) WITH CRI.APPLICATION NO.1774 OF 2007 (STATE OF MAHARASHTRA VS. SANJAY HANUMANDAS KARWA .& ANR.) _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court's orders or directions and Registrar's orders. Court's or Judge's orders ______________________________________________________________________________________________ Shri Anil S. Mardikar, Advocate for Applicant. Shri T.A. Mirza, A.P.P. for Respondent No.1. Shri U.N. Vyas, Advocate for Respondents No.2 & 3. CORAM : R.C.CHAVAN, J. DATED : NOVEMBER 17, 2008. 1. Criminal Application No.1774/2007 under Section 482 read with Section 439 (2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure is filed by the State for cancellation of anticipatory bail granted to Sanjay Hanumandas Karwa and Sudhakar Pundlik Yeole, respondents No.2 & 3 herein, by the learned Sessions Judge, Akola by order dated 30th May, 2007. 2. Shri U.N. Vyas learned counsel waives service for respondents No.1 and 2. 3. Cri. Application No.1568/2007 is filed for the same purpose by the original complainant Jaidev S. Gurudev. Sanjay 2 and Sudhakar were stated to be employees of Mega Automobiles, a contractor, who had been engaged by Akola Municipal Corporation for collecting Octroi. The respondents were found to be collecting money from transporters and pocketing a big chunk for themselves and issuing receipt of small amount. A report was made to the Police on 20th May, 2007. Two other employees Anil Mantri and Sagar Shende were arrested and sent to police custody, transferred to magisterial custody and eventually bailed out. The applicants applied for anticipatory bail on 22nd May, 2007 but did not press the application for interim bail. On 25th May, 2007 since the prosecution did not produce case diary, they were granted interim bail whereby they were required to attend Police Station concerned every day between 4.00 p.m. to 5.00 p.m. This bail order was eventually confirmed on 30th May, 2007. 4. The learned Assistant Public Prosecutor states that custodial investigation of the respondent is necessary in order to secure the documents in the possession of the respondent. He also submitted that the learned Sessions Judge was not 3 justified in granting anticipatory bail to respondents who were involved in serious offence of forgery and misuse of Government receipts. Similar arguments were advanced on behalf of respondents employer i.e. the applicant in Cri. Application No.1568/2007. 5. The prosecution 's endeavour to oppose application for bail at the time when bail was granted to these two persons would have been more fruitful than this belated attempt to have the bail cancelled. That the case diary could not be produced before the Sessions Judge since it was before the Magistrate was a very lame excuse, in an age when xeroxing is easily possible. After interim bail was granted to the respondents on 25th May, 2007, they were available for interrogation before the police on successive dates. It is not clear as to what made the police to squander this opportunity. Now, one year and six months after the applicants were admitted to bail the investigating agency expects to unearth the some incriminating material by subjecting the respondents to custodial investigation. Optimism of the Investigating Agency 4 is laudable. Presuming that the respondents were involved in commission of the offence involved, it would be futile to expect that after such a lapse of time the prosecution would be successful in unearthing anything from the respondents. The application by the State shows that receipts which were issued by the respondents were for meager amounts when consignments were allowed to pass after pocketing substantial amounts. If that is so, counter foils of the receipts would be available with the Municipal Coporation or respondent's employer to enable it to trace the consignee or consignor to find out as to what was the amount the respondents pocketed. For that, subjecting the respondents to custodial interrogation is not required. 6. In view of this, no case is made out for cancellation or revocation of order dated 30.05.2007. Both these applications are rejected. JUDGE RR.