MADICHARLA NAGESWARA SASTRY Vs. STATE OF A P

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS petition is filed under him in CC No. 103 of 2005 on the file of section 482 Cr. P. C. by petitioner-A. 10 II Additional Judicial Magistrate of First seeking to quash the proceedings against Class, Eluru, West Godavari District.

(2.) THE petitioner-A. 10 along with others is accused of offences punishable under Sections 420, 468, 471, 477-A read with 109 and 120-B IPC and Section 69 of the Indian Stamps Act. The petitioner-A. 10 worked as Sub-Registrar at Akiveedu, A. 1, a. 9, A. 12 and A. 14 to A. 18 are the licensed stamp vendors for the sale of non-judicial stamps and A. 19 and A. 20 are the un-licensed stamp vendors. The other accused worked as Sub-Registrars at different places during the relevant period in 1995. According to the prosecution, the government of Andhra Pradesh re-fixed the market value of the lands with effect from 1. 4. 1995 and the benefit of old market value for the purpose of registration was allowed to the transactions that took place upto 31. 3. 1995. It is alleged that the Stamp vendors and Sub-Registrars conspired together to gain monetary benefit and indulged in sale of stamps with anti-dates. The specific allegation against the Sub-Registrars including the petitioner-A. 10 is that they failed to verify/scrutinize the genuineness of the same, the date of entry of the sales register, date of purchase of the stamps from the Sub Treasury Office and the date of sale to the parties and thereby failed to perform their legitimate duties and on the other hand actively connived with the stamp vendors and with the document writers with an intention to make wrongful gain to themselves and abused their official position as public servants for gaining pecuniary advantage which resulted in huge loss of revenue to the Government. On the basis of the report of the enquiry by the then D. I. G. of Stamps, the District Registrar, Bheemavaram gave a complaint to C. I. D. police who registered a case in Cr. No. 34 of 2000. On completion of the investigation, the Inspector of Police, cid, Vijayawada, filed charge-sheet before the II Additional Judicial Magistrate of First class, Eluru. The learned Magistrate has taken cognizance in CC No. 103 of 2005 and issued process against the accused. Aggrieved by the same, the petitioner-A. 10 who worked as Sub-Registrar, Akiveedu, filed present petition seeking to quash the proceedings against him mainly on the ground that there was no sanction for prosecution as contemplated under Section 197 cr. P. C. against him, who was a public servant.

(3.) ARGUMENTS of the learned Counsel for the petitioner and the learned Special public Prosecutor for the respondents are heard. Records are perused.