SASIDHARAN Vs. STATE OF KERALA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN this appeal preferred from the Central Prison, Thiruvananthapuram, the appellant who was the sole accused in SC No. 787/2001 on the file of the Additional Sessions Judge, Fast Track Court (Adhoc) No. I, Thiruvananthapuram, challenges the conviction entered and the sentence passed against him for an offences punishable under S.55(a) of the Abkari Act.

(2.) THE case of the prosecution is that on 15/05/1998 at 5 p.m. while the Excise Preventive Officer (PW 5) attached to the Excise Office, Kazhakuttom was proceeding on patrol duty along the Panachamoodu Murukkumpuzhakadavu road they came across the accused carrying a black plastic can having a capacity of 2 litres containing two litres of illicit arrack and that the accused has thereby committed offences punishable under S.8(1) and 58 of the Abkari Act.

(3.) AFTER the close of the prosecution evidence the accused was questioned under S.313(1)(b) CrPC with regard to the incriminating circumstances appearing against him in the evidence for the prosecution. He denied those circumstances and maintained his innocence. He submitted before Court that he was running a mobile tea stall in the Murukkumpuzhakadavu and was falsely implicated in this case on account of the enmity between his family and that of PW 5.