PURAN CHAND BHAGAT Vs. UNION TERRITORY OF J&K

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Vide order dtd. 9/10/2021 passed by the court of Special Judge Anti Corruption, Udhampur (hereinafter to be referred as the trial court), the petitioner has been charged for commission of offences under sec. 5(1) read with sec. 5(2) of the J&K Prevention of Corruption Act, 2006 (for short the Act) in a challan, titled, "Union Territory of J&K through Anti Corruption Bureau, Doda vs Puran Chand".

(2.) The petitioner has assailed the order dtd. 9/10/2021 passed by the learned trial court on the grounds that there is no question of making any demand and accepting the amount in pursuance of the said demand, the petitioner on 20/5/2019 was not in his office at Udhampur as the petitioner was at official duty in Jammu which is more than 70 kms away from the Udhampur SFC Office, where the petitioner attended the office of General Manager (West) Jammu and also attended the office of the Divisional Manager (DM) Workshop SFC, Jammu regarding the repair of the official vehicle. In order to support this contention, the tour general approved by the General Manager has been placed on record. It is also stated that the prosecution sanction under sec. 6 of the Act is required to be granted by the authorized authority, who is competent to remove any public servant from his office at the time when the offence has been allegedly committed by the accused. In the instant case, the petitioner is an employee of the Jammu and Kashmir State Forest Corporation (SFC) and the same is a public sector undertaking and the sanction for prosecution of the petitioner was required to be obtained from the Managing Director of Jammu and Kashmir SFC and not from any other department but the prosecution sanction has been obtained by the General Administration Department vide order dtd. 14/9/2020. It is also stated that the impugned challan presented against the petitioner is liable to be quashed on the ground that the respondent No. 3 had himself not completed the codal formalities for release of the alleged 10% balance payment and there is no official residential quarter in the name of petitioner as alleged by the prosecution in the charge sheet and there is no link and connection with the so called residential quarter.

(3.) Ms. Monika Kohli, learned counsel for the petitioner has laid stress only on two issues i.e. the petitioner was not in Udhampur on 20/5/2019 as he was in Jammu in connection with his official duties and further that the sanction to prosecute the petitioner has not been issued by the competent authority.