INDERJIT SINGH Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These twenty-eight criminal appeals are directed against a common judgment dated 15/5/1985 passed by the High court of Punjab and Haryana in Criminal Appeals Nos. 153-SB to 156-SB, 161-SB, 174-SB to 178-SB, 185-SB to 189-SB, 193-SB to 196-SB, 199-SB to 202-SB and 205-SB to 207-SB of 1983 and two Criminal Revisions Nos. 773 and 774 of 1983 since treated as appeals by the Punjab and Haryana High court. All the said appeals arose out of the judgment passed by the learned Additional Sessions Judge exercising the powers of Special Judge, convicting and sentencing the appellants. As the facts and circumstances were similar in all the said 28 appeals, they were disposed of by the High court of Punjab and Haryana by a common judgment. Before this court also all the above 28 appeals have been heard analogously and they are being disposed of by a common judgment.

(2.) The prosecution case in short is that the government of India initiated a crash scheme of rural employment to give relief in the rural areas by executing some intensive projects to give employment in all the districts in the State of Punjab. Under the instruction of government of India, the Development Commissioner and secretary to the government of Punjab apprised all the Deputy Commissioners in the State of Punjab about such scheme. Under the terms of the said crash scheme, for each district, ten lakh rupees were allocated. Over and above, a sum of rupees two and a half lakhs were also allowed for implementing the said scheme. The said scheme was centrally controlled scheme in the shape of grants-in-aid. For implementing the said crash scheme, six projects were started by the Public Works Department (Drainage Section) in the District of Amritsar. Shri Kailash Chand was the Superintending Engineer and Shri Kuldip Singh Sidhu was the Executive Engineer concerning the said projects. These six projects were meant to desilt six drains, namely, Sakki Nullah, Kasur Nullah, Sohal Drain, Jhabal Drain, Kairon Drain and Devi Dass Pura Drain. The amounts allotted to each of the six projects were expected to be spent by the end of the financial year, 31/3/1972. One Chanchal Singh of Village Jhabal Filed a complaint to the Chief Engineer (Drainage) alleging that although huge amounts were reportedly spent on desilting Jhabal Drain but actually nothing had been done at the spot. Such complaint was processed and in due course in April 1972, the Minister concerned ordered Superintending Engineer (Vigilance) Shri B. R. Saini of Public Works Department to enquire into the allegations. Shri Saini thereafter visited the sites of all the six projects and submined his reports indicating that embezzlement of huge amount by the officials concerned had taken place in implementing the said projects. On the basis of such report, investigations were conducted by the Vigilance Bureau and after tile completion of investigations, six first information reports were registered In July 1973, pertaining to all the six projects. Amongst the accusedin the criminal cases instituted on the basis of the said FIRs. Shri K. S. Sidhu Executive Engineer, was stated to be the man in charge of all these projects. The a other accused persons were Sub-Divisional Officers, Sectional Officers, Sub-Divisional Clerks. They were divided into six groups to execute the work under Shri K. S. Sidhu. According to the prosecution, during the police investigation it was detected that a sum of Rs. 4,35,832. 00 was embezzled in connection with implementation of Sakki Nullah Project, Rs. 7,74,000. 00 was embezzled relating to Kasur Nullah Project, Rs. 1,46,803. 00 was embezzled in respect of Sohal Drain Project, Rs. 1,62,291. 00 was embezzled in relation to Jhabal Drain Project, Rs. 78,638. 00 was embezzled relating to Kairon Drain Project and Rs. 1,02,413. 00 was embezzled in respect of Devi Dass Pura Drain Project, It was further found on the basis of the investigation that the embezzlements were pursuant to criminal conspiracy of the accused persons and while perpetrating the offences, they had also forged and falsified the records and used such false and fabricated records as genuine. The accused were eventually tried in six separate trials relating to each of the said projects by a Special Judge appointed by the State government under Section 6 of the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 1952. The accused, however, in their statements made under Section 313, Code of Criminal Procedure, denied the charges and pleaded innocence. The Special Judge after considering the evidence adduced in the case convicted and sentenced all the accused under Section 5 (1 (d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act and under S. 466, 468, 471, 477-A and 120-B of the Indian Penal Code and passed various sentences for the said offences as referred to in the judgment of the learned trial Judge.

(3.) The High court in the impugned judgment has held that there was no direct evidence against the accused persons who were appellants before the High court in support of the charges levelled against the accused and the prosecution has relied only upon circumstantial evidence. Coming to the circumstantial evidences sought to be relied on by the prosecution, the High court has held that the prosecution, in all the said cases, produced a number of witnesses to prove that although vouchers had been prepared in the name of the said witnesses, they had neither worked on such projects nor did they receive any payment. The High court has, however, held that the testimony of those witnesses had lost its value because it was not possible to come to a conclusion that they were the same persons in whose names the vouchers were prepared. It has been categorically held by the High court that the witnesses did not prove one way or the other whether the payments were actually made on the vouchers which contained their names.