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| High Court quashes disproportionate assets case against former MD SICOP | | | Early Times Report
JAMMU, Mar 16: Justice Javed Iqbal Wani of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh High Court quashed the FIR NO 25/2019 in Disproportionate Assets Case registered by ACB Jammu against Bhupinder Singh Dua, then MD SICOP.
Justice Javed Iqabl Wani after hearing Sr. Adv Sunil Sethi with Adv Parimoksh Seth for the petitioner, observed that the perusal of the CD file further tends to show that in the impugned FIR, the respondents have included golden/silver jewellery and the amount of cash, having been seized admittedly from the ground floor of the house of the petitioner, which house stands scrutinized and investigated into by the respondents in earlier FIR 10/1997. Perusal of the record would further reveal that in earlier FIR 10/1997, the respondents have had brought under investigation the factories belonging to the relatives of the petitioner and had verified the same, having found none of them belonging to the petitioner. Although in the impugned FIR, nine factories are alleged to be belonging to the petitioner, however, perusal of the CD reveals that they said allegation and assertion has not been substantiated by the investigating agency.
The assertion of the petitioner that there has been a judicial separation between him and his wife in 1997, has not been disputed or else denied by the respondents, so is also not being disputed and denied by the respondents that the petitioner is living separately in the first floor of the house at Nanak Nagar and his wife and children in the ground floor and that whatever recoveries have been made during investigation had been made from the ground floor and not from the first floor where the petitioner is living. Perusal of the CD file reveals that petitioner and his other family members have accounted for the jewellery and cash recovered appropriately and satisfactorily and owing to that, the respondents, therefore, have failed to make any headway in the investigation of the case and to substantiate the allegations levelled against the petitioner much less the offenses alleged to have been committed by him as covered in the impugned FIR. CD file would further reveal that ever since the date of undertaking of the investigation and the initial recoveries made thereof by the respondents during the course of investigation, no headway has been made in the investigation from initial stage, so much so no incriminating material or evidence worth the name, has been collected by the investigating agency against the petitioner for supporting the case set up by the investigating agency, that too in view of the fact that there has been no stay granted by this Court against conducting of investigation in the impugned FIR. A further perusal of the CD file and material collected thereof would manifestly demonstrate that it is highly unsafe to make the conviction of the petitioner upon the evidence collected so far by the investigating agency as the basis of the prosecution case and evidence collected during the course of investigation renders it highly improbable to have the petitioner charged and convicted for the offences covered in the impugned FIR. This Court cannot overlook the fact that the respondents in the earlier FIR 10/1997 and the present impugned FIR, have levelled broad allegations viz-a-viz the same and similar assets against petitioner as noticed in the preceding paras.
The Court observed that another aspect of the matter as well cannot be ignored by this Court, though having been noticed in the preceding paras, being registration and closure of earlier FIR 10/1997 supra against the petitioner under the Act of 2006, as also FIR 23/2019 having been quashed by this Court again registered under the provisions of Act of 2006. The impugned FIR is 3rd in succession registered by the respondent against the petitioner and broadly with the same and similar allegations against the petitioner. The law is no more res integra that registration of successive FIRs in connection with same or connected cognizable offenses have been held to be violative of Article 21 of the constitution.
Insofar as exercise of inherent powers enshrined under Section 482 Cr.P.C is concerned, law is settled and is no more res-integra that in exercise of the wholesome power vested in the High Courts under Section 482 Cr.P.C, the High Court is entitled to quash a proceeding, if it comes to the conclusion that allowing the proceedings to continue would be an abuse of process of the Court or that the ends of justice require that the proceedings ought to be quashed. The saving of the High Courts' inherent powers, both in civil and criminal matters, is designed to achieve a solitary public purpose, which is that the Court proceedings ought not to be permitted to degenerate into a weapon of harassment or persecution. In a criminal case, the veiled object behind a lame prosecution, the very nature of the material on which the structure of the prosecution rests and the like would justify the High Court in quashing the proceedings in the interest of justice. The ends of justice are higher than the ends of mere law, though justice has got to be administered according to the laws made by the legislature. The submissions made by counsel for the respondents inasmuch as judgements cited in support of the said submissions do not lend any support to the case of the respondent and by no sense of imagination, can said to be potent enough to dislodge the case set up by the petitioner.
With these observations Court in the exercise of inherent jurisdiction enshrined under Section 482 CrPC is held to be warranted. Accordingly, petition is allowed and impugned FIR is quashed.
—JNF |
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