ZAHIRUDDIN Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal from a judgment of the High Court in Bengal, which allowed an appeal against a Police Magistrate's order acquitting the appellant of a charge of accepting a bribe brought under S. 161, Indian Penal Code. The High Court set aside the order of acquittal, convicted the appellant and sentenced him to one year's rigorous imprisonment.

(2.) The main ground of appeal is that there have been contraventions of S. 162, Criminal PC, that the High Court's judgment relies on the testimony of a witness, Mr. Roy, who had given a signed statement to the police in breach of the section and had, also in breach of the section, had it before him and made substantial use of it while he was giving evidence. It was also made a ground of appeal that the police officers engaged on the investigation had failed to keep a diary in contravention of S. 172 (1).

(3.) The appellant was employed from June till 24-8-1944, by the East Indian Railway as a grain depot officer at Howrah station. His chief duty was to receive from contractors articles for which orders were placed by the head office of the company, to compare them with approved samples and subsequently to distribute them. On 22-8-1944, a contractor named Bhattacharjee reported to Deputy Superintendent Dutt of the Calcutta Police that the appellant had solicited from him a bribe of Rs. 400 to pass a sale of 80 maunds of mustard oil and that he proposed to make this payment next day. Bhattacharjee subsequently gave evidence at the trial that the appellant had made this demand, but this evidence was not corroborated by any other witness. A police trap was laid for the appellant on 23 August, but its only result was that Bhattacharjee reported that the appellant was now refusing to take Rs. 400 and was demanding that Rs. 800 should be paid to him on 24th August at his residence at Park Circus. Another police trap was therefore prepared for the appellant, and on 24 August Police Superintendent Dutt, Mr. Roy, a Magistrate whose services as a witness had been obtained, Police Inspector Lahiri and Bhattacharjee went in a taxi driven by one Yasin to the block of flats in Park Circus where the appellant and his brother Nazimuddin lived. It was then after 8 P. M, the black-out was in force, and it was raining heavily. It was decided that Bhattacharjee should stay in the taxi with Mr. Roy, while Mr. Dutt and Inspector Lahiri stood by a lorry which was stranded on the pavement between the taxi and the flats. One of the party then called the doorkeeper, Ram Surdar, and sent him with a message to the appellant that someone had come by taxi to see him but was prevented by an injured leg from going up to the appellant's flat.