Court No. - 48
Case :- APPLICATION U/S 482 No. - 17684 of 2018 Applicant :- Urmila Pandey And Another Opposite Party :- State Of U.P. And Another Counsel for Applicant :- Anand Kumar Pandey,Saroj Kumar Dubey Counsel for Opposite Party :- G.A.
Hon'ble Karuna Nand Bajpayee,J.
Supplementary affidavit has been filed on behalf of the applicant today in court, which is taken on record.
This application u/s 482 Cr.P.C. has been filed seeking the quashing of the summoning order dated 4.4.2018 passed by the Addl. District Judge, Court No.6, Ballia in S.T. No. 360 of 2016, arising out case crime no. 21 of 2015, under Sections 363, 366 and 376 IPC, P.S. Dokati, District Ballia.
Heard learned counsel for the applicants and learned A.G.A. and perused the record.
Submission of counsel for the applicants is that the summoning u/s 319 Cr.P.C. has been done without recording the finding that the evidence is of such nature that will result in the conviction of the accused. Contention is that the evidence produced in the court should be of such nature which must constitute a sure basis to entail conviction, otherwise the additional accused should not be summoned to face trial. Learned counsel has sought to contend that the evidence produced in the court is not worth placing reliance upon and the prosecution cannot succeed to procure from the court the verdict of the guilt against the accused on that basis. Further submission is that the Investigating Officer did not find or collect any such evidence which could justify the submission of charge sheet against the applicants and this aspect of the matter has been wholly ignored by the trial court and the court proceeded only on the basis of the evidence produced in the court without any reference to the findings and conclusions arrived at by the Investigating Officer.
So far as the requirement of recording the finding about the sufficiency of evidence for the purposes of conviction is concerned, there is no such requirement of law. The standard of adjudging the sufficiency of evidence to vindicate the summoning of additional accused u/s 319 of Cr.P.C. is not the same which is to be applied at the time of final adjudication on the point of guilt or innocence of a particular accused. The two are different stages and required different degrees of rigour to be employed in evaluating the evidence and its worth. It cannot be successfully argued that all those accused who are summoned u/s 319 of Cr.P.C. must be attended with the fate of conviction at the time of final judgement. The only desirable thing is that while summoning the additional accused u/s 319 Cr.P.C. the court has to be circumspect and should apply a higher standard of satisfaction and a superior standard of evaluating the sufficiency of evidence to summon the additional accused. The standard to summon an accused u/s 204 of Cr.P.C. is on a different footing than the yardstick which is to be employed in deciding the appropriateness of summoning an additional accused u/s 319 Cr.P.C., and as per the Apex Court's decision given in the case of Hardeep Singh vs. State of Punjab and others, 2014 (3) SCC-92 the requirement is that the court should not proceed in a cavalier fashion and should be evaluating the evidence with a higher standard of appreciation with care.
So far as the investigation aspect of the matter is concerned, the law in this regard is also well settled. The findings of the Investigating Officer or the material collected by him are not conclusive or binding guidelines for the court which must act independently on its own. Even in cases where the Investigating officer failed to collect sufficient evidence against the accused persons nominated in the F.I.R. or even in those cases where according to the inference drawn by the Investigating Officer certain accused were found to have been wrongly nominated, the trial court can still proceed to summon such accused to face trial if the evidence produced against such accused before the court inspires confidence. The submission of final report in favour of certain accused or the non submission of the charge sheet against certain accused does not and cannot denude the trial court from its power and jurisdiction to summon those accused to face trial. It shall all depend upon the nature of evidence produced in the court during the course of trial from which shall emanate the need, justification and desirability or the appropriateness of summoning the additional accused who are not facing the trial before the court.
So far as the facts of the present case are concerned, there is no ambiguity and the order passed by the court below reflects judicial application of mind. The facts have been analyzed in right perspective and the order impugned does not reflect either perversity or any casual approach. There is nothing to indicate that the court has proceeded in a cavalier fashion or that the sufficiency of evidence was in any manner lacking for the purposes of invoking the provisions of Section-319 of Cr.P.C. It is also to be kept in perspective that exercise of power u/s 319 of Cr.P.C. is a matter which comes within the realm of the trial court and involves the exercise of trial's court judicial discretion. Ordinarily unless some element of perversity in the exercise of such discretion is found or some express breach of law or some flagrant misreading of evidence is reflected in the order passed by the trial court, this Court is slow to interfere and substitute the lower court's discretion by its own, even if a different or another view could also have possibly been taken. In the present case, this Court does not see any good reason to take a different view in the matter than the one that has been adopted by the trial court.
In the considered opinion of this Court, the application has no merits and there is no justifiable reason to interfere in the impugned order. The prayer to quash the impugned order is therefore, refused.
However, it may be observed that the applicants want to appear before court below and get themselves bailed out and, therefore, a protective direction may be issued to the lower court to decide the bail application of the applicants.
In view of the peculiar facts and circumstances of the case, it is directed that in case after surrendering in the court below an application for bail is moved on behalf of the accused within two weeks from today, the same shall be considered and decided in accordance with law.
In the aforesaid period or till the date of appearance of the accused in the court below, whichever is earlier, no coercive measures shall be taken or given effect to.
It is made clear that if this order is not availed by the accused within stipulated period of time, no time extension application shall be entertained.
It is further clarified that for the present this order has been passed only with regard to the accused on behalf of whom this application u/s 482 Cr.P.C. has been moved in this Court.
With the aforesaid observations, this application is finally disposed off.
Order Date :- 30.5.2018 CPP/-