BALUBHA PABUBHA KER Vs. STATE OF GUJARAT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Prayer is made by the complainant for cancellation of bail for the offence punishable under Ss. 7, 13(1)(a) and 13(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 (the Act). The case is registered before the ACB Police Station, Devbhumi Dwarka being CR No. I-3 of 2021. The complaint came to be filed on the ground that the complainant and two of his friends for the purpose of protection of agriculture field made an application for weapon and it was stated that the respondent No. 2 - Deputy Collector, demanded an amount of Rs.3.00 lakh (for each application Rs.1.00 lakh), for favourable consideration of the applications. The complainant stated that the conversation had been electronically recorded and thereafter, on complaint being filed before the competent authority, a trap was laid down and in execution of such trap, the respondent No. 2 was found having accepted the amount of Rs.3.00 lakh and recovery of the said amount was from the chamber of the Deputy Collector, Dwarka. He came to be arrested thereafter. The cancellation of bail has been sought on the ground of gravity of charge and that the Investigating Officer (IO) has not placed on record the details of disproportionate assets of the accused and the regular bail came to be granted by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Devbhumi Dwarka on a conclusion that the Charge-sheet has been filed and all the papers were recovered and nothing remains to be investigated.

(2.) Learned advocate Mr. Rajesh K. Savjani for the applicant, de facto complainant, submitted that when the bail came to be granted, voice spectrography of the accused and the witnesses was yet to be done, in spite of that the learned Sessions Judge came to the conclusion that that would not affect the evidence in relation to the pending investigation qua the disproportionate assets which is said to be in process. The learned advocate for the applicant submitted that there is a breach of condition since the accused has not cooperated with the IO.

(3.) Learned advocate Mr. Hriday Buch for the respondent No. 2 - accused submitted that as such it was a trap and states that on completion of the trap, the panchnama was drawn and further states that it was a case of demand, acceptance and recovery and the Charge-sheet has been filed and the accused had been in jail from 14/10/2021 to 28/12/2021 and the voice spectrography has already been concluded and thus, the learned advocate for the respondent No. 2 stated that there is no any supervening circumstances brought to the notice of this Court or any ground to consider for cancellation of bail.