STATE OF HIMACHAL PRADESH Vs. HARI CHAND

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal filed by State of Himachal Pradesh under Section 378 of the Cr.P.C. against the judgment of the court of learned Judicial Magistrate Ist Class, Baijnath, District Kangra, H.P., dated 31.12.2002, vide which the respondents were acquitted of the charge framed against them under Sections 409, 467, 468 and 471 IPC.

(2.) Briefly stated, the facts of the case are that accused No. 1 was the President of Gram Panchayat, Kothi Kohar w.e.f. April 1988 to 17 March, 1991, while accused No. 2 was working as a Panchayat Secretary in the same Panchayat. Many development works were undertaken by the Panchayat, which were got done by accused Nos. 1 and 2. The accused persons did the work under Jawahar Rojgar Yojna and under some other Schemes also. The amounts were received by them from the BDO for the various works by preparing forged documents. Special audit of the Panchayat was conducted and it was found that names of some labourers were mentioned in two muster rolls for different works on the same date. Thus, it was clear, according to the police, that the accused had forged these muster rolls by entering the names of labourers in both the muster rolls. There were also other evidence in regard to tampering of the record and misuse of the amount by both the respondents. On investigation, a prima facie case was made out under the Sections mentioned above as against both the respondents, who were tried by the learned trial Court, as detailed above, leading to their acquittal.

(3.) We have heard Mr. Vivek Thakur, learned Additional Advocate General for the appellant, Mr. Ajay Mohan Goel, Advocate, for respondent No. 1 and Mr. R.K. Gautam, learned Senior Advocate for the respondent No. 2, and have gone through the record of the case.