RAM KISHUN PRASAD Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner has come up against the order of his conviction under Section 406 of the Indian Penal Code and the sentence, as modified by the appellate Court, of six months' rigorous imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 250.00 passed thereunder.

(2.) The prosecution case is that the petitioner was a Headmaster of a school at the relevant date of the occurrence and in such capacity he used to receive bags of "Daliav for feeding the children of the school under the "Care" programme. The bags so received used to be stored in the house of one Sheonandan. On 28.5.1967 at about 4 O'clock in the morning when the owner of the house aforesaid, namely, Sheonandan, was sleeping inside the Angan, the other members of his family being away from the village, P. Ws. 1 and 2 who have their bathans adjacent to the house of Sheonandan, found the petitioner coming to the store, taking out two bags of "Dalia" therefrom, getting them loaded on a bullock-cart driven by the second accused (who has been acquitted) in order to carry them to his house in a village one or two miles away. P. Ws. 1 and 2 also heard the petitioner settling the fare of the cart for the purpose of carrying the two bags to his house. The immediate neighbours not being available, P. Ws. 1 and 2 both went to the house of P. W. 3, where a number of villagers used to sleep, and informed them the incident. As a result thereof, P. W. 3 and others proceeded and intercepted the cart. The other witnesses also arrived there. The cart was taken to the Block Office where a written report (Ext. 1) was given by P. W. 3 on its basis, the case was instituted.

(3.) The defence of the petitioner is that he has been falsely implicated. tie pleaded alibi by stating that he had gone to his village in the morning of the date of occurrence and was not there at all at the relevant time.