SATYANARAYAN DAS Vs. STATE OF ORISSA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal against the order of conviction in an offence under Section 21 of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 (hereinafter referred to as "N.D.P.S.Act"), Sentencing to undergo rigorous imprisonment for 10 years.

(2.) The prosecution case, in brief, is that on 25-5-91 on receiving reliable information that one Pravat Kumar Das was in illegal possession of brown sugar in his house, the petrolling party headed by P.W.3, the Sub-Inspector of Excise attached to E.I.and E.R.Unit-I, Cuttack proceeded to his house in village Damana and on search of his house brown sugar was recovered, the same was seized, people was taken, then the accused was arrested and his statement was recorded. Pravat Kumar Das made a statement that accused Priyabrata Mishra used to supply brown sugar to him and the accused led P.W.3 and others to B.D.A.Colony, Bhubaneswar and identified the house of accused of Priyabrata, His house was searched, but no contraband article could be recovered. Priyabrata Mishra disclosed that he was procuring brown sugar from accused Satyanarayan Das of village Khandapada and was supplying them to accused Pravat Kumar Das. P.W.3 arrested accused Priyabrata and he led P.W.3 and others to the house of accused Satyanarayan Das of village Khandapada and identified his house. Accused-appellant Satyanarayan Das was found present and his house was searched. Brown sugar was recovered from his possession, which was seized, sample collected and was sent for chemical examination and it was found that the seized substance was brown sugar. The defence plea is one of complete denial of the occurrence.

(3.) The prosecution examined four witnesses of whom P.W.1 was Ladukishore Panigrahi, Excise Constable, who accompanied P.W.3 on 15-5-91, P.W.2 is Niranjan Saiguru, a resident of Khandapada. However, he did not support the prosecution cases and was declared hostile, P.W.3, Pradipta Ranjan Pattniak is the S.I.of Excise attached to Excise Intelligence and Enforcement Bureau who led the patrolling party and conducted search and seizure and recovered the alleged brown sugar from the house of the appellant, P.W.4 in Sunil Kumar Poddar, the Inspector-in-charge, E.I.and/E.S.Unit-I, Cuttack who produced the information register of 1991-92 maintained by the Unit.