SUKHDEV SINGH Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) PETITIONER Sukhdev Singh, Ex-Field Assistant Markfed, Branch Guru Har Sahai, District Ferozepur, has filed this petition under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure read with Article 227 of the Constitution of India, for quashing FIR No. 19 of 1985, registered with Police Station, Gurhar Sahai, District Ferozepur under Section 409 of the Indian Penal Code, being wholly illegal.

(2.) THE petitioner was appointed as Food Sub Inspector in the year 1970 and was posted in District Hoshiarpur. In the year 1980, he was transferred and posted as Field Assistant in the Branch Office Gurhar Sahai and remained there upto February, 1983. A case was registered under Section 409 IPC in January, 1985 at the instance of the District Manager, Markfed, Ferozepur against the petitioner alongwith four others for the alleged shortages committed in the year 1982. In nutshell, it is alleged in the First Information Report Annexure P-1 that the petitioner along with four other officials named in the FIR had embezzed the stock worth Rs. 5,33,121.17 and a request was made to the police authorities to get a case registered against the five officials including the petitioner.

(3.) IN the reply filed by the respondent, it has been denied that the petitioner has been subjected to prolonged prosecution and it has further been pleaded that the prosecution against the petitioner was launched in the year 1985 while the arbitration proceedings against him were initiated by the Markfed in the year 1988 i.e. after launching of the prosecution and, therefore, there is no ground to quash the First Information Report and the resultant proceedings against him. The offence under Section 409 IPC is stated to have been committed by the petitioner in the year 1982 and the FIR was registered against him and four others in the year 1985, while the challan was presented in the trial Court in the year 1988.