STATE OF GUJARAT Vs. SHANTILAL @ KANTILAL RAMJIBHAI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Inspite of the mentioning in judgments times without number that panchas in corruption case should always be independent persons not interested, in the prosecution or the complainant in any way, we find here a strange case where clerk from the office of the D.S.P. has been examined as Panch No. 1 who has to accompany the complainant at the time of raid for seeing and hearing what transpired between the complainant and the accused and then to corroborate the complainant's evidence, whose evidence is no better than that of an accomplice, we find in the present case that observations made by this court have been flouted to the extreme. Such a panch can never corroborate the evidence of the complainant. It is a well known principle that one tainted source of evidence cannot corroborate another tainted source of evidence.