RANGEELA SAH Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE solitary appellant was charged under Sections 20(b)(ii)(c)of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act(`the Act' for short)and was put on trial in N.D.P.S. case No.23 of 2002 by the learned Sessions Judge, Buxar and by the judgment which was delivered by the learned Additional Sessions Judge-V, Buxar on 08.02.2008 in the above noted case was found guilty of committing the said offence. After hearing the appellant on sentence on 14.02.2008 the learned Special Judge directed the appellant to suffer rigorous imprisonment for ten years as also to pay a fine of Rs.1,00000/-, else to suffer rigorous imprisonment for two and half years.

(2.) THE informant P.W.1 stated that during the review of Simri P.S.Case No.124 of 2002 some of the accused persons of that case had dropped some informations that if the houses of accused Vashistha Singh, Antu Sah, Ravi Upadhyay, Prem Singh, Chunnu Singh, Sunil Singh, Shivshankar Singh and others were searched, there could be chances of recovery of huge quantity of ganja from them as they were in the illegal trade of the contraband since long. THE police further got information from the confession of the accused that they had stored some ganja in the house of accused Vashistha Singh and Antu Sah and if the raid was conducted then the same could be recovered. Accordingly, Dy.S.P., Dumaraon authorized the informant P.W.1 Chandrama Prasad who conducted a raid at the relevant places and, accordingly, a team of police personnel and other officers were formed which included the above noted Dy.S.P., the Block Development Officer, Simri, Circle Officer, Simri and some other police officers. THEy all came to the house of Antu Sah where this appellant was found sitting and on enquiry, he pointed out that the absconding accused Antu Sah was his younger brother. On search of the house, ganja kept and concealed at three different places in three different modes, like, under the bed and in a box and also in gunny bags, weighing 300 K.Gs. was recovered. THE search and recovery memo was pasted on the wall of the house and the appellant was arrested. THE houses of Shivshanker Singh, Dinesh Singh were also searched and different quantities of ganja were recovered. Besides, from under a bed in the joint house of this appellant and absconding accused Antu Sah, some arms as per description in Ext-3/2 were recovered which included a D.D.B.L. gun with some cartridges. THE seizure memos Ext-3, 3/1, 3/2, 3/3 were prepared in presence of the witnesses.