Ajay vs State Of Rajasthan

The petitioner has filed the instant revision petition under Section 397/401 CrPC seeking to assail the order dated 22.10.2019 passed by the learned Special Judge, NDPS Act Cases, Jodhpur in Criminal Misc. Application No.382/2019, whereby the application filed by the petitioner under Section 451/457 CrPC for getting his Bolero vehicle No.RJ-19-UA-4263 released on Supurdginama was rejected.

I have heard and considered the arguments advanced at bar and gone through the material available on record.

Admittedly, the petitioner is the registered owner of the vehicle in question. He claims to have sold the same to his brother Rakesh through an agreement. Rakesh rather than paying the installments towards the hire purchase agreement executed with the Finance Company, i.e. Cholamandalam Investment & Finance Company Limited, misused the vehicle by using it to ply contraband poppy straw weighing 20 kg., which was seized by the SHO, Police Station Bhopalgarh on 17.04.2019. The petitioner claims to have rescinded the agreement to sale. It is further stated that the entire dues of the finance company, i.e. Cholamandalam Investment & Finance Company Limited, from whom the finance facility for purchasing the vehicle in question was availed, have been cleared off.

Placing reliance on the Supreme Court decision in the case of Sunderbhai Ambalal Desai & Ors. Vs. State of Gujarat [AIR 2003 SC 638], Mr. Surendra Singh Choudhary, representing the petitioner, urges that no useful purpose would be served by keeping the vehicle lying idle at the police station because it will rot and get wasted away by exposure to elements. He, thus, urges that pending trial of the case, the petitioner's vehicle should be returned to him on Supurdginama.

Learned Public Prosecutor vehemently and fervently opposed the submissions of the petitioner's counsel.

Mr. Ashwini Kumar Swami, learned counsel representing the Finance Company, does not object to the vehicle being handed over to the petitioner on Supurdginama.

Admittedly, the petitioner was not present in the vehicle when the seizure was effected and he is not an accused in the case. This is also not disputed that the recovered contraband poppy straw weighs 20 kg., which is well below the commercial quantity. It cannot be disputed that if the vehicle is permitted to lie at the police station, it will be rendered to scrap by exposure to elements.

In this view of the matter, I am of the opinion that pending trial of the case, the vehicle in question, of which the petitioner is the registered owner, deserves to be handed over to him on Supurdginama.

Thus, the revision deserves to be and is hereby allowed. The impugned order dated 22.10.2019 passed by the learned Special Judge, NDPS Cases, Jodhpur is set aside. The vehicle in question shall be handed over to the petitioner upon his furnishing a Supurdginama alongwith the personal and surety bonds to the satisfaction of the trial court, which shall quantify the amount of personal and surety bonds in accordance with the value of the vehicle after ascertaining the same from the original sale deed etc.