R.JAGADESWARA REDDY Vs. STATE OF A.P.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Assailing the conviction and sentence in C.C.No.9 of 2003, dtd. 15/11/2007, by the Additional Special Judge for SPE and ACB Cases, City Civil Court, Hyderabad, wherein the appellant was convicted under Sec. 7 and Sec. 13(1)(d) read with Sec. 13(2) of Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 and sentenced to suffer Rigorous Imprisonment for one year and to pay a fine of Rs.2,000.00 under each count, the present appeal is filed under Sec. 374 Cr.P.C.

(2.) The substance of the charge against the accused officer is that, while he was working as Prohibition & Excise Inspector, Penukonda, demanded and accepted a sum of Rs.5,000.00 from Chintala Jayachandra on 27/4/2002, as illegal gratification, other than legal remuneration, for doing a favour of not booking any case and conduct raids on his shop.

(3.) The facts in issue are as under : Since the principal witness i.e., P.W.1 did not support the prosecution case, certain facts, as mentioned in the charge-sheet, are required to be mentioned for understanding the prosecution case. P.W.1 was working as a salesman at Yaswanth Wines, Somandepalli, Penukonda, Anantapur District. The licence for the said wine shop was in the name of one Mallikarjuna (P.W.5), but the business was transacted by one Ramakanth Reddy (P.W.4). The accused officer was working as Inspector, Prohibition & Excise, Penukonda, at the relevant point of time. On 25/4/2002, the accused officer is alleged to have gone to the wine shop and demanded a sum of Rs.5,000.00 as illegal gratification from P.W.1, for doing a favour of not booking cases against the wine shop. He was informed that if amount is not paid, he will conduct raids on the shop and book cases leading to cancellation of licence. It is said that the complainant (P.W.1) expressed his inability to pay such huge bribe as business was not good and also as the owner was away from the village. But, however, the accused officer insisted on payment of bribe of Rs.5,000.00. Further, the accused officer is alleged to have demanded P.W.1 to come to his house by the evening of 27/4/2002 with the bribe amount. As P.W.1 was not willing to pay any bribe, he proceeded to the office of Dy.S.P., A.C.B., Anantapur and preferred a oral complaint on 26/4/2002 at 3.00 PM. The same was reduced into writing by the Inspector of Police, A.C.B., Anantapur (P.W.13). The contents were read over to the complainant, who admitted it to be true. Ex.P17 is the said statement. After receiving the complaint, P.W.6 asked P.W.1 to come to A.C.B. office on 27/4/2002 at 4.00 PM along with the proposed bribe amount of Rs.5,000.00. Meanwhile, the antecedents of the accused officer and the genuineness of the complaint were verified. After obtaining permission, P.W.6 registered a case in crime No.3/ACB-ATP/2002 under Sec. 7 of the Act and issued F.I.R., which is placed on record as Ex.P18. On the next day at 4.00 PM, P.W.1 is said to have appeared before P.W.6, by which time he secured the presence of P.W.2 and one Sankarappa to act as mediators. The pre-trap proceedings were conducted in his office between 4.30 PM and 6.45 PM. During the said proceedings, P.W.1 was introduced to the mediators and they were asked to enquire about the contents of the complaint. Thereafter, P.W.1 produced Rs.5,000.00, consisting of two (2) five hundred rupee notes and thirty one (31) hundred rupee notes and eighteen (18) fifty rupee notes. One of the mediators noted down the serial numbers of the notes in the first mediators' report, which is placed on record as Ex.P6. Thereafter, demonstration about the phenolphthalein test was conducted and the significance of the same was explained to P.W.1. P.W.6 instructed one Police Constable to apply phenolphthalein power on the bribe amount and thereafter the amount was kept in left side shirt pocket of P.W.1, with a caution that he has to remove the notes from his pocket only on demand made by the accused officer and not otherwise. He was also asked to come out and give a signal by wiping his face with lungi in a bending position on acceptance of money by the accused officer. After completing the pre-trap proceedings and taking the precaution that the hands of the trap party members do not have any traces of phenolphthalein powder, the entire trap party, including P.W.1, left the A.C.B. Office at 7.00 PM in a Government vehicle, and reached Penukonda at 9.00 PM. The vehicles were stopped at Satalingeswara Alayam. P.W.1 and one P.C. were asked to get down from the jeep and proceed towards the residence of the accused. Except P.W.1 all others took vantage positions. P.W.1 was further instructed that he has to pay the money only on demand and not otherwise.