CHATNAYA SB (CAPTAIN) Vs. STATE OF J&K

JUDGEMENT

(1.) CAPTAIN Chatnayas application seeking release on bail in a case arising out of FIR No. 34/2008 registered at Police Station Gangyal under Sections 306/498 -A RPC was rejected by 3rd Additional Sessions Judge, Jammu, on September 29, 2008. He has approached this Court seeking his release on bail.

(2.) I have considered the submissions of Shri Sethi appearing for the applicant and Shri Sharma, learned Additional Advocate General, appearing for the State in the light of judgments they had referred to at the time of consideration of this application.

(3.) APPLICANTS counsels submission that applicant is entitled to his release on bail in view of the provisions of Section 167(2) of Code of Criminal Procedure, arises out of a misconception, in that, he treats the Final Police Report, the Police Challan, as it is commonly so known, which had been filed within the prescribed period of 60 days of applicants arrest, as an incomplete police challan because the investigation had not been completed by that time as the Investigating Police Officer would require some more time to record the statements of some of the witnesses under Section 161 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, who are stated to have been posted at far off places and the Forensic Science Laboratorys Report too was awaited. This is so because the Police Challan, which had been filed within the period prescribed under Section 167(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, does not indicate it to be an incomplete Police Challan. It, on the other hand, is in the requisite form prescribed by the State Government for production of Final Police Report under Section 173 (2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Not only this, the Final Police Report contains, besides a list of 53 witnesses which the Investigating Police Officer had relied upon to substantiate the charge against the applicant, the statements of witnesses recorded under Section 164 -A and Section 161 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. A categoric finding too stands recorded in the Final Police Report that, on the basis of the evidence collected by the Investigation Police Officer, a case for commission of offences punishable under Sections 306 and 498 -A RPC had been made out against the applicant. The documents relied upon in the case too form part of the challan. Mere recital in the report that statements of some more witnesses, who were posted at far off places, were yet to be recorded and the Report of the Forensic Science Laboratory had to be obtained, would not, in my opinion, make the Police Challan filed in the present case, an incomplete Final Police Report. Filing of subsequent supplementary challan to form part of the original challan too would not affect the status of earlier filed Final Police Report.