State Rep. By D.S.P., ... vs K.V. Rajendran & Ors

5. On 26th of August, 1998 the Revenue Divisional Officer (in short `the RDO') Mayiladuthurai received a phone call regarding smuggling of sandalwood and teak wood logs. The RDO immediately made enquiries and 3 4 discovered that the call was a false alarm. During the enquiry it also came to light that the caller was one K.V Rajendran son of Vardarajan (the Respondent herein). He had impersonated as a reporter of the Indian Express and made a hoax call to the officer. On 27th of August, 1998 at 01.00 hrs, the RDO appeared before the Superintendent of Police Nagapattinam and made a complaint against the Respondent. He produced a statement given by the Respondent wherein he had admitted the allegations made against him. The Respondent was identified as a Lecturer in Government Presidency College, Madras. On the personal complaint of the RDO, a case was registered in Porayiar police Station against the Respondent under Sections 177, 186 and 506(ii) of the Indian Penal Code. The Respondent was arrested and in the morning of 27th of August 1998, he was produced before the Judicial Magistrate No. 2 Mayiladuthurai and remanded to judicial custody. On the next day, the respondent was granted bail and was released from custody. On 2nd of September, 1998, 4 5 the respondent herein alleged to have given a complaint against the RDO and other officers for having tortured him and for having committed other illegal acts between 26th of August 1998 and 28th August, 1998.

6. On 06th of September, 1998, the respondent filed a petition before the State Human Rights Commission, Tamil Nadu. On this complaint, the District Collector, Nagapattinam, ordered an elaborate enquiry and on the basis of such an order, a report was submitted to him. On 05th of October, 1998, the District Revenue Officer (DRO) and the Additional District Magistrate submitted the report of their enquiry to the District Collector. According to this report, the allegations leveled against the RDO and the other personnel by the respondent appeared to be an afterthought and totally false. On 08th of October, 1998, the aforesaid report was forwarded to the State Human Rights Commission, Tamil Nadu. The Commission accepted the report and informed the respondent that the Commission was satisfied that no further enquiry should be conducted at 5 6 the level of the Commission. The Commission did not proceed with the matter and following the view taken by them, a departmental enquiry that was initiated, was also dropped.

9. A plain reading of the aforesaid order, refusing to hand over the investigation to CBI, would show that the said order was a final order rejecting the prayer of the appellant before the High Court. Subsequent to the disposing of the application, that is to say, after 3 = years, the DSP (SB CID) Chennai had filed an application in the aforesaid disposed of petition saying that on the date of the aforesaid final order of the High Court dated 1st of March, 2001, there was no post of DSP (SB CID) Nagapattinam, as the said post was abolished by a Government order dated 17th of May, 2000. It was also brought to the notice by the DSP (SB CID) Nagapattinam that in Rule 57 of the Manual 8 9 for Instructions for State Special Branch, the Special Branch Officers were not empowered to conduct investigation of cases. Accordingly, an application was filed by him in the disposed of criminal petition for modification of the final order dated 1st of March, 2001 and for a direction to the DSP (CB CID) Nagapattinam instead of DSP (SB CID) Nagapattinam for investigation. This application filed by DSP (SBCID) was registered as Crl. M.P. 3713/2001.

11. The aforesaid application filed by DSP (SB CID) Nagapattinam, and the application filed by the complainant/respondent in the disposed of criminal petition 9 10 were heard by the same learned Judge and this time, by the impugned order, the learned Judge directed that it would be better to transfer the investigation to CBI and, accordingly, the Investigating Officer was directed to hand over the case diary and other records forthwith to the Director, CBI, New Delhi, who will hand over the same to a competent officer to make further investigation and take appropriate action against the concerned and file the final report within three months from the date of the receipt of the order. By the aforesaid order, the original final order refusing to hand over the investigation to CBI authorities dated 1st of March, 2001, was modified. It is this order now in appeal before us.

22. In the present case, we find that the High Court, in the original final order, disposing of the petition under Section 482 of the Code has specifically given reasons for rejecting the prayer for handing over the investigation to the CBI authorities.

23. That apart, after the final order was passed rejecting the prayer of the respondent to hand over the investigation to the CBI authorities, by which, the criminal petition filed under Section 482 was practically rejected, it was not open to the High Court to pass a fresh order in the disposed of petition or even in the pending petition of the DSP (SB 15 16 CID) Nagapattinam, directing investigation to be made by the CBI authorities.

24. As noted herein earlier, Section 362 of the Code prohibits a Court from making alternation in a judgment after the final order or Judgment was signed by the Court disposing of the case finally except to correct clerical or arithmetical errors. In our view, therefore, Section 362 of the Code cannot apply in the facts and circumstances of the present case. There was no clerical or arithmetical error in the order.

25. That apart, the respondents did not file any independent application for transferring the investigation from the State Police authorities to the CBI authorities on certain events which had occurred after the final order was passed by the High Court disposing of the earlier criminal petition under Section 482 of the Code. A prayer could be made by the respondents before the High Court for transferring the investigation from the State Police authorities to the CBI by filing a fresh petition under 16 17 Section 482 of the Code in view of subsequent events that had taken place after the final order disposing of the earlier criminal petition was passed. Again, as noted herein earlier, the respondents had never applied for transferring the investigation from State Police authorities to the CBI by making an independent application. Accordingly, we do not think that the High Court was justified in handing over the investigation of the case from the State Police authorities to the CBI authorities. It is needless to mention that it would be open for the respondent to make independent application under Section 482 of the Code if they find that subsequent events having been taken place, the investigation must be transferred from State Police authorities to CBI. Accordingly, we are unable to sustain the impugned order of the High Court in view of our discussions made hereinabove. Therefore, the impugned order is set aside. The appeal is thus allowed.

26. We make it clear once again that if a fresh criminal petition under Section 482 of the Code is filed by the 17 18 respondents for transferring the investigation from State Police authorities to CBI after bringing certain subsequent events that had taken place after the disposal of the original criminal petition if there be any, it would be open for the High Court to entertain such application if it is warranted and decide the same in accordance with law for which we express no opinion on merit.

27. For the reasons aforesaid, the appeal is thus allowed to the extent indicated above.

18 19 IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. OF 2008 (Arising out of SLP (Crl) No. 5238 of 2004) State Rep. By D.S.P., S.B.C.I.D., Chenai ...

The judgment in the above matter is sent herewith for your perusal and kind consideration.

With warm regards, ..............................

[TARUN CHATTERJEE ] 19 20 Hon. Mr. Justice P. Sathasivam 20