State of H.P. vs Yadupati Sharma

Surjit Singh, J.—State has appealed against the judgment, dated 6.8.2005, of learned Special Judge (Forests), Shimla, whereby respondent Yadupati Sharma, who was tried for offences, under Sections 420, 468, 471 IPC and Section 13(2 read with Section 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1998, has been acquitted.

Prosecution''s case may be summed up thus. Respondent was Director of H.P. State Cooperative Wool Procurement Marketing Federation, Shimla and thus, a public servant. In his capacity as Director of the said Federation, he was required to undertake various journeys to different places, of course, at the expense of the Federation, which used to pay him TA and other expenses, on the basis of claims submitted by him, in the form of TA bills and supporting vouchers. Sometime in the year 1988, he was paid an advance of Rs. 48,000/- to meet travelling expenses. He submitted various bills. Bills worth Rs. 6268/- were cleared and adjusted against the advance. Other bills worth Rs. 32187/- were not cleared. Objections were raised by PW-1 Baldev Raj, Inspector Cooperative Societies. Those objections were noted down on the bills. None of those bills was cleared, meaning thereby that their amounts were not adjusted against the aforesaid advance of Rs. 48,000/-.

Some of the bills, detail of which is given below, submitted by the respondent, were allegedly supported by false vouchers or some false claims had been raised therein and, so, report was made to the Enforcement Department of the State of Himachal Pradesh.

Detail of Bills allegedly supported by forged documents, or which otherwise were based on false claims

Sr. No.

Exhibit assigned to TA Bill.

Exhibit assigned to allegedly forged voucher

Amount of Bill

Amount of Bill

1.

Ext.PW1/L

Ext. PW1/M, taxi charges receipt.

Rs. 2060/-

Voucher is blank

2.

Ext.PW1/N

i) Ext.PW1/Z-21 ii) Ext.PW1/Z-22 Cash memos. of hotel charges.

Rs. 9268/-

Amount of hotel charges, which was initially Rs. 260/- had been changed by additions/ alterations to Rs. 440/-.

3.

Ext.PW1/P

____

Rs. 6369/-

Stay at Ludhiana on 7.2.99 is shown and journey to Shimla is shown to have been performed on 8.2.1999. However, as per entry in register Ext.PW1/Z-25 maintained at the guest house of the Federation at Shimla, respondent stayed at Shimla on 7.2.1999.

4.

Ext.PW1/V

--

Rs. 1900/-

Expenses for the journey claimed in the Bill had already been claimed by the respondent in an earlier bill Ext.PW1/Z-17, which was for a sum of Rs. 2100/-.

5.

Ext.PW1/Z-2

Ext.PW1/Z-3

Rs. 1692/-

Voucher bears machine printed number No.221 and it is dated 29.11.98. It is in the form of taxi charges receipt. Respondent submitted another voucher of taxi fare issued by the same person with another bill. The date of that receipt is 3.11.1998, but its machine printed number is 228. It is Ext.PW1/Z-5. Receipt No.221 could not have been issued subsequent to the issue of receipt No. 228.

6.

Ext.PW1/Z-11

Ext.PW1/Z-12 Receipt of taxi charges.

Rs. 10035/-

Bill is alleged to include false claim, as the taxi was also used by some other persons of Wool Federation alongwith the respondent, for which a sum of Rs. 8000/- has been claimed by the respondent, exclusively.

7.

Ext.PW1/Z-13

Ext.PW1/Z-23 Receipt of hotel charges

Rs. 10168/-

(i) In the Bill besides claiming expenses for travelling to Amritsar and Ludhiana, respondent claimed expenses for going to Delhi and stayed there, for which he was not authorized. (ii) Receipt Ext.PW1/Z-23 regarding hotel charges for stay at Amritsar was inflated by addition/alteration.

8.

Ext.PW1/T

Ext.PW1/U

Rs. 2060/-

Voucher is fake.

During the course of investigation, police recorded statements of the persons by whom the allegedly forged vouchers, submitted by the respondent with the TA Bill, purport to have been issued. Specimen writings of the respondent were obtained and Government Examiner of Questioned Documents was approached to compare the same with the allegedly forged portions of the vouchers. Expert expressed inability to express any definite opinion. On completion of investigation, Challan was filed in the Court of Special Judge, who after complying with the requirement of Section 207 Cr. P.C, charged the respondent with the aforesaid offences. He did not plead guilty to the charge and was, therefore, put on trial.

Respondent in his statement, u/s 313 Cr. P.C. denied that vouchers submitted by him were fake or forged. He also denied having made any false claim.

Trial Court held that the case of the prosecution did not stand proved and acquitted the respondent.

I have heard learned Assistant Public Prosecutor, appearing for the appellant as also the learned Counsel for the respondent and gone through the record.

It will be in the fitness of things and appropriate if the evidence of the prosecution, with respect to each of the aforesaid bills with supporting vouchers, is examined separately.

First bill is Ext.PW1/L. Claim of this bill is alleged to be false, on account of taxi fare receipt Ext.PW1/M, submitted with it, being blank. Submission of a blank receipt does not amount to forgery nor does it amount to making a false claim. If the appellant had the intention of making false claim, he would not have submitted blank printed form of the receipt Ext. PW1/M. He was not to draw the amount of bill himself. It was to be cleared and passed by the Federation of the respondent, which did not pass it, on account of receipt being blank.

Next TA Bill is Ext. PW1/N. Vouchers Exts. PW1/Z-21 and PW1/Z-22, submitted with the bill, on account of hotel expenses, were alleged to be forged. The alleged forgery was that the amount on these vouchers had been raised from Rs. 260/- to Rs. 440/-. Prosecution examined the hotelier, namely PW-15 Jagmohan, who stated that as per carbon copies of the receipts, photostat copies of which were proved by him as Exts. PW15/A and PW15/B, amount charged against each of the receipts was Rs. 260/- and not Rs. 440/-. Prosecution, however, did not produce the original duplicate copies in the receipt book nor did it examine the persons who issued receipts Exts. PW1/Z-21 and PW1/Z-22. PW-15 Jagmohan stated in the cross-examination that receipts had not been issued by him. Handwriting Expert though did opine, vide opinion Ext.PW17/A-12 that there were alterations in the figures of the vouchers, he did not opine that the same were in the hand of the respondent. Respondent''s plea is that he made no changes in the vouchers and that he had been charged an amount of Rs. 440/- for each of the two vouchers. His counsel submits that may be that hotel people were doing this mischief to evade taxes, in the nature of luxury tax and Income Tax. It is further submitted by the learned Counsel that as per rules, respondent was entitled to maximum of hotel charges @ Rs. 200/- per day and, therefore, there was hardly any need for him to raise the amounts of vouchers by altering the figures. It is not disputed that the entitlement of the respondent was limited upto Rs. 200/- for stay in hotel.

In view of the aforesaid submissions, the view taken by learned trial Court cannot be said to be perverse.

Next Bill is Ext. PW1/P. Allegation is that respondent showed his stay at Ludhiana in the TA Bill on 7.2.1999 and return journey to Shimla is shown to have been performed on 8.2.1999, but in Register Ext. PW1/Z-25, maintained at the Guest House of the Federation at Shimla, he is shown to have stayed in the said guest house on 7.2.1999. Prosecution examined PW-6 Shri Hem Chand, Chowkidar of the Guest House. He proved relevant entry. Entry is not signed by the respondent and, therefore, on the basis of this entry it cannot be said with certainty that the respondent in fact stayed at Shimla on 7.2.1999. In any case, in Bill Ext. PW1/P, he did not claim any TA for stay at Ludhiana for 7.2.1999 and showed his stay at Ludhiana for that date, as private. Entry in the register is doubtful, because in the register entries are not made date-wise. For example, some entries pertaining to stay of some guests on 31.12.1998 are shown prior to the entries pertaining to stay of some other guests on 29.12.1998. Entries are marked ''A'',''B'',''C'' in the register.

Above discussion apart, PW-6 Hem Chand, Chowkidar, in his cross-examination, stated that as a matter of fact respondent had stayed in the guest house at Shimla on 8.2.1999, but the date had been wrongly recorded as 7.2.1999. He was not cross-examined by the prosecution. Therefore, respondent cannot be said to have made any false claim in TA Bill Ext. PW1/P, with regard to his stay at Ludhiana on 7.2.1999, especially when he did not make any claim for that day in the TA Bill.

As regards TA Bill Ext. PW1/V, allegation is that for the journeys shown in this bill, another bill, Ext. PW1/Z-17, submitted by the respondent had already been cleared. Respondent''s explanation is that as a matter of fact he had submitted Bill Ext. PW1/V earlier in point of time to the bill Ext. PW1/Z-17 and that since in Bill Ext. PW1/V reference to one of the two meetings held on the same date could not be made, so, revised Bill Ext. PW1/Z-17 was submitted. Admittedly, Bill Ext. PW1/V has not been cleared nor has it been adjusted against the advance. There is no evidence, indicating that Bill Ext. PW1/V was submitted subsequent to the submission of Bill Ext. PW1/Z- 17, the amount of which had been adjusted against the advance. Therefore, explanation rendered by the respondent cannot be said to be improbable.

Coming to bill Ext. PW1/Z-2, allegation of dishonesty is based on the inference that while the machine printed number of receipt Ext. PW1/Z-3 dated 29.11.1998, issued by the same taxi owner is 221, number of receipt Ext. PW1/Z-5 dated 3.11.998 is 228. It is true that normally a receipt bearing higher number is issued subsequent to the receipt bearing lower number and it is not so in the present case, but that by itself is not enough to hold that either of the two receipts is forged. Prosecution examined the Taxi Driver, namely PW-12 Amar Chand, who testified that receipt Ext. PW1/Z-3 dated 29.11.1998, which was submitted with Bill Ext. PW1/Z-2, had been issued by him. He was not examined with respect to second receipt No.228 Ext. PW1/Z-5, dated 3.11.1998. So, receipt Ext. PW1/Z-3 submitted with Bill Ext. PW1/Z-2 cannot be said to be forged.

Bill Ext. PW1/Z-11 is alleged to include false claim, on account of some persons of Wool Federation having travelled with the respondent in the same taxi for which a sum of Rs. 8000/- is claimed, on account of taxi charges. Prosecution examined the persons, who allegedly travelled with the respondent. They are PW-7 Deepak Saini and PW-8 Vijay Thakur. Both the witnesses denied having travelled with the respondent in the taxi, in question, on the date mentioned in the bill. Thus, this allegation also does not stand established.

As regards Bill Ext. PW1/Z-13, accusation is that respondent claimed TA for travelling to Delhi, in addition to performing journey to Ludhiana and Amritsar, though he was not authorized to travel to Delhi. Even if it be assumed that the respondent was not authorized to travel to Delhi, his making a claim for unauthorized journey, which claim the Federation has not cleared, does not amount to forgery or even cheating.

Another allegation with respect to Bill Ext. PW1/Z-13 is that voucher Ext. PW1/Z-23, in the nature of hotel expenses for stay at Amritsar, had been forged and the amount was raised from Rs. 90/- to Rs. 190/-, by forgery. Prosecution examined the hotelier, namely PW-9 Narinder Singh, who stated that amount mentioned in the carbon copy was Rs. 90/- only and he produced the photostat copy of that carbon copy, which is Mark-X. Explanation of the respondent is the same, as he submitted in respect of vouchers Ext. PW1/Z-21 and PW1/Z-22, submitted with Bill Ext. PW1/N, which explanation has been held to be not improbable.

Voucher Ext. PW1/U submitted with Bill Ext. PW1/T to claim taxi charges to the tune of Rs. 1700/- is alleged to be forged. Receipt purports to have been issued by the driver, named Parma Ram. Prosecution did not examine him. Instead it examined the owner of the taxi by the name of Chaman Sain, who appeared as PW-10. The witness stated that the receipt is not issued by him, though he claimed to be the owner of the taxi. Since the receipt does not purport to have been issued by the owner, but by the driver, named Parma Ram, prosecution was supposed to have examined said Parma Ram. Thus, this allegation also cannot be said to have been proved.

As a result of above discussion, I do not find any reason to interfere with the judgment of acquittal, passed by the trial court. Hence, the appeal is dismissed.