B G MANDANAIK Vs. CBI JAMMU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners invoke the extra ordinary jurisdiction of this Court vested under Article 226 of the Constitution of India read with Section 103 of the Constitution of State of Jammu and Kashmir for issuing, inter alia following writs:-

(2.) Briefly stated the facts leading to the filing of the petition are; An FIR against the petitioners came to be registered with the CBI, ACB on the basis of source information that the petitioner No.1, the then Deputy Chief Engineer, Konkan Railway Corporation Limited ('KRCL' for short) Sangaldhan, Reasi, J&K in conspiracy with his wife, the petitioner No.2, amassed assets and made investments disproportionate to their known source of income by abusing the official position by the petitioner No.1 while he was working with KRCL at Sangaldhan, Reasi, J&K and other places during the period from January, 2001 to May, 2011. It was alleged that Rs.10.00 lakh in cash was found concealed in the self-stitched pockets of petticoat of the petitioner No.2. This was stated to have been found in the possession of the petitioner No.2 during her frisking at Jammu Airport while she was boarding flight for Delhi-Bangalore along with petitioner No.1. The aforesaid amount was allegedly seized by the Income Tax Authorities at Bangalore. It has further come out that out of the said seized amount of Rs.10.00 lakh, Rs.1,00,000 was returned to the petitioner No.2 while as the rest was seized as the petitioners could not explain the possession of such amount to the satisfaction of the Income Tax Authorities.

(3.) That after the registration of the FIR, the matter was investigated by the CBI, which submitted the closure report before the trial Court. The closure report appears to have been submitted by the CBI on the ground that during investigation they did not find it a fit case for launching criminal prosecution against the petitioners as they could not find the evidence to conclude that the assets and investments made by the petitioners were disproportionate to their known source of income. The trial Court, however, did not accept the closure report and came to the conclusion that on the basis of the facts and evidence collected by the Investigating Officer during investigation, it was prima-facie demonstrable that the petitioners had committed offence under Section 120-B RPC read with Section 5(2), 5(1) (e) of the Jammu and Kashmir Prevention of Corruption Act, 2006. The trial Court, however, could not take the cognizance for the reason that the CBI had not obtained previous sanction from the competent authority in terms of the Section 6 of the Jammu and Kashmir Prevention of Corruption Act, 2006. The trial Court, accordingly, retained the closure report and directed the CBI to obtain necessary sanction against the petitioners and file final report under section 173 of the J&K Cr.PC in the shape of the charge sheet/police challan in a proper format with all relied upon oral and documentary evidence as per the list already annexed with the closure report. Two months period was granted to the CBI to do the needful.