LAWS(KER)-2005-12-18

T MOOSA Vs. SUB INSPECTOR OF POLICE

Decided On December 23, 2005
T.MOOSA Appellant
V/S
SUB-INSPECTOR OF POLICE, VADAKARA POLICE STATION Respondents

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The above Criminal Miscellaneous Cases are filed under Section 432 of the Code of Criminal Procedure seeking to quash the criminal proceedings initiated against the petitioners herein on the ground that the co-accused in the respective cases were acquitted on trial. The case of the petitioners who were absconders were separated and are now proceeded with in their respective cases. The co-accused against whom case was proceeded with earlier were finally acquitted on appreciation of the evidence in each of the cases above. It was contended that as the prosecution failed to prove the guilt of any of them, no useful purpose will be served by conducting trial against them and it will be an abuse of process of the court and to secure the ends of justice further proceedings against the petitioners is to be quashed. In support thereof reliance was placed on the decision of a Division Bench of this Court in Arun Kumar v. State of Kerala reported in . Crl. M.C. Nos. 1053, 1067 & 1078/2005 came up for consideration before a Learned Judge of this Court who after referring to the decisions in Joy v. State of Kerala 2002 (3) KLT 425, Chellappan v. State of Kerala 1992(1) KLT 609, Balakrishna Pillai v. State of Kerala 1971 KLT SN.3, Felix v. State and Ors. 1980 KLT 612 and also Arun Kumar's case cited supra, was of the view that there is apparent conflict in the Division Bench and Single Bench rulings of this Court and the matter required to be referred to a Full Bench In the reference order, Ramkumar, J. also expressed his feeling that granting relief to an absconder accused may give a wrong message to a law abiding co-accused who stood trial that it was foolish on his part to attend the process of trial and its result will be that like-minded accused persons also will be tempted to adopt elucive tatics for the eventual resort to such short-cut method. Subsequently, Crl. M.C. Nos. 3102,3300, 3460 and other connected matters which came up for consideration before a Division Bench of this Court also were referred to the Full Bench.

(2.) The dictum laid down in Arun Kumar's case is as follows:

(3.) In Chellappan Pillai v. State of Kerala 1992 (1) KLT 609 another Division Bench of this Court, however, held that acquittal of a co-accused in a prior trial does not mean that the absconding accused who is subsequently tried is also entitled to an acquittal. In the order of reference detailed reference is made to some of the decisions of the apex court and a few rendered by this Court and observed that it is desirable to lay down sufficient guidelines by a Full Bench so as to resolve the conflict in the Division Bench decision and Single Bench ruling of this Court. The above cases were thus placed for consideration by a Full Bench.