Judgement in Human-Trafficking Offences Allegedly Commited by Army Personnel

IN THE COURT OF MANOJ JAIN: SPECIAL JUDGE (PC ACT) (CBI) SOUTH DISTRICT: SAKET DISTRICT COURTS NEW
DELHI CC No. 46/2011 RC RC RC RC RC RC SI82007E0006-EOU-IV SI82008E0001-EOU-IV SI82008E0002-EOU-IV SI82008E0003-EOU-IV SI82008E0004-EOU-IV SI82008E0005-EOU-IV
U/s 120B r/w 419/420/467/468/471 of IPC & Sec. 12 of Passports Act, & Sec. 13 (2) r/w 13 (1) (d) of PC Act. CBI 74/4, Rifles Delhi, Math, Pradesh. 2 Israel Anil Kumar Vs. 1 M. Suresh Babu, Son of Sh.M. Sundara Rao, Resident of Qtrs. No. Ichamati Lines, Rajputana
Regimental Centre, Delhi Cantonment Area, New Permanent Address: S-21/549, Keshar Nagar, near Nerad Secundarabad, Nagrajan Andhra
Israel Raja @ Rajah @ Raja @
Nagrajan @ Joel Brother, Son of Sh. Arasan, Resident of 51, Moti Bagh near
CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011 1
Nanakpura Gurudwara. 3 David Abraham Johnson, Son of Sh. Perumal, Resident of G-124, JJ Colony, Wazirpur, New Delhi. Navneet Singh, Son of Sh. Kulwant Singh, Resident of Mohalla Gopal Nagar, Village Jandiala Guru, Amritsar, Punjab. Rajinder Singh, Son of Sh. Kashmir Singh, Resident of Dhirkot PO Garhi Mandi, PS Jandialaguru, Amritsar, Punjab. Gurdev Singh, Son of late Sh. Joginder Singh, Resident of Village Naushera, PO Pannua, PS Sarhali, Taran Taaran, Amritsar, Punjab. Varinder Singh, Son of Sh. Nirmal Singh, Resident of Village & PO Patnoora, Lubana, PSA Bhogpur, Distt. Punjab. 8 Gurjant Singh, Son of Sh. Balbir Singh, Resident of Village Naushera PO Pannua PS Sarhali,Taran Taaran, Amritsar, Punjab.
2
Jalandhar,
CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011
Date of Institution Date of framing of charge 09.09.2009 Date on which case was received Transfer by this Court Date of conclusion of arguments 02.07.2012 Date of Judgment
: on : :
12.05.2008 : 15.11.2011 : 13.07.2012
Memo of Appearance
Sh. Sh. Sh. Sh. Sh. Jagbir Singh, ld. PP for CBI. Rakesh Malhotra ld. counsel for A1 Paramjeet Singh, ld. counsel for A5, A6 & A8 Kulwinder Singh, ld. counsel for A4 & A7 S.N.Pandey, ld. counsel for A2 & A3
JUDGMENT
Kabootarbazi denotes going abroad through illicit means. It is an act involving human-trafficking. The term Kabootarbazi is derived from the distinctive attribute of kabootar (pigeon) to fly and land silently and surreptitiously. Rural youth, from North India in particular, is fanatically crazy about settling abroad. Lure of west and temptation of hefty employment package compel them to gag the mouths of agents with money. Sometimes they raise money by selling off whatever they possess and sometimes even by taking loans from friends and relatives knowing fully well that it might be well nigh impossible to repay such debt. It becomes rampant whenever any group takes to skies for participation in any event. It can
be a sporting event. It can be a musical group as well. By falsely showing any such person to be the part of any such group, persons are sent abroad on false documents and naturally, they never return to their Motherland. Indian Army is known for its dedication in security matters. Its band has also created a niche for itself in the field of Music. Who can stop thinking about the melodious Beating Retreat? It is, in fact, a treat to Eyes and Ears. Military Bands, Pipes and Drums Bands, Buglers and Trumpeters from various Army Regiments perform during the ceremony. Indian Army Band is world renowned but it was never thought, even in the wildest imagination, that human trafficking would take place for an event in which Indian Army Band was supposed to perform in Berlin in 2008. PROSECUTION VERSION 1.0 On 01.11.2007, five accused persons i.e. Nagarajan Israel
Raja (hereinafter referred to as A2), Rajender Singh (hereinafter referred to as A5), Gurdev Singh (hereinafter referred to as A6), Varinder Singh (hereinafter referred to as A7) and Gurjant Singh (hereinafter referred to as A8) reached I.G.I. Airport, New Delhi. They were holding official passports and E-Tickets and wanted to go to Frankfurt by Air India Flight No. AI-127. Officials at Airport suspected their credentials as they all were supposed to be army personnel but spot inquiry revealed that they were neither army officials nor entitled to any official passport. 1.1 Except for the photographs, all the particulars mentioned
in such passports were found to be untrue.

1.2
A7 Varinder Singh was found in possession of one official
passport which was in the name of Jagtar Singh and he revealed that such journey had been arranged through agents and a meeting was fixed with A2 at airport and at airport, A2 handed over aforesaid official passport to him. 1.3 A8 Gurjant Singh was found in possession of official
passport which was in the name of one Sher Singh and he revealed that he had acquired such official passport from one agent namely Navneet Singh (accused herein and he would be referred to as A4) who in turn had referred him to one other agent thereafter A2 had given him that official passport. 1.4 Similar story was narrated by A6 who was found in i. e. A2 and
possession of passport in the name of Jasbir Singh and he also indicted A4 Navneet Singh and A2 Nagarajan as agents. 1.5 A5 Rajender Singh was also found in possession of one
official passport in the name of Bikram Singh and he also blamed his co accused A2 Nagarajan and A4 Navneet Singh. 1.6 It would be worthwhile to mention that A2 Nagarajan was
also apprehended with forged official passport. Such passport was in the name of one Anil Kumar and on interrogation, it was revealed that he was a carrier as well as agent and he was taking said four persons i. e. A5 Rajender Singh, A6 Gurdev Singh, A7 Varinder Singh and A8 Gurjant Singh to Germany on forged official passports and he
had obtained such official passports from M. Suresh Babu (accused herein and he would be referred to as A1) by paying him Rs.2.50 lacs. 1.7 A1 Suresh Babu was, in fact, an army personnel but he A2 Nagarajan also revealed that he used to Johnson
had already left for Germany a day before on official passport on official assignment. meet A1 M. Suresh Babu as well as David Abraham
(accused herein and he would be referred to as A3) and later, A3 introduced him to A4 Navneet Singh who had given him Rs.11.50 lacs for making arrangement for sending three persons to Germany. 1.8 Accordingly, five separate FIRs were registered against
said five accused persons by PS I.G.I. Airport. 1.9 Ministry of Defence informed CBI that in the month of
October, 2007, Indian Army Band had to proceed to Germany for participation in 13th Berlin Military Band Festival. Such team consisted of 42 persons including 2 officers. 10 more persons were kept as reserved as stand by. However, official passports were got arranged for all of them including reserved officials for participation in said festival. It was also informed that preliminary had abused his official position and investigation conducted by army revealed that Lance Naik Suresh Babu i. e. A1 conspired with some public official persons and private persons and fraudulently obtained
passports and diverted the same to private persons against consideration. It was also suspected that A1 was also responsible for facilitating issuance of diplomatic passport to one Brigadier H. P.
S. Bedi and
also obtained official passport
for one Smt. Harleen
Chadha whereas
they both were not entitled to such passports in cash along with DO
and when the house of A1 was raided by army authorities, they recovered 44 passports and Rs.1.20 lacs letter Pads of Senior Officers of Army from his house. 1.10 CBI was accordingly requested to register FIR in order to
unearth nexus between army personnel and criminals dealing with illegal immigration. 1.11 On the basis of such complaint dated 28.11.2007
received from Ministry of Defence, Govt. of India, CBI registered case no. RC SI82007E0006-EOU-IV.
1.12
Since all the previous cases registered at I. G. I. Airport
also fell within the scope of investigation of said RC SI82007E0006EOU-IV registered by CBI, the other five cases were also transferred to CBI from Delhi Police and accordingly five corresponding RCs were also registered. 1.13 Investigation revealed that A1 was posted as Lance Naik
in the Directorate of Ceremonial and Welfare-I, Army Headquarters, South Block, New Delhi. He was entrusted with responsibility to deal with preparation of official passports in respect of those army officials who were scheduled to participate in said music festival. This was as per the previous practice as A1 knew about the procedure and had got prepared official passports for such like music festivals on previous occasions as well. He hatched conspiracy with all his other
co accused.
A1 filled up application forms in respect of 51 army
officials and affixed photographs of some private persons on application forms instead of actually selected army officials and kept as reserved. He also forged signatures of Colonel Satender Singh, Director of Ceremonial and Welfare-I in all the 51 applications and took those blank applications to the passport office situated at Patiala in him and House, New Delhi. Officials of MEA had also blind faith
passports were made available to him and taking undue
advantage of such fact, he pasted photographs of private persons, including of A2, A5, A6, A7 and A8 and the concerned MEA official signed the passports believing passports. all such passports to be genuine A1 then personally received all such 51 passports and
then in terms of conspiracy, said five fake official passports were handed over to A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja. 1.14 E-tickets were purchased by A2 Nagarajan. One room in
Hotel Airport Inn, Mahipal Pur was booked by A3 David Johnson. A4 also joined hands with them and came there with A5, A6 and A8. As far as A7 Varinder Singh is concerned, he reached directly to airport on 01.11.2007 where he met all his co accused except A1 who had already flown to Germany a day before. 1.15 persons Thus as per the investigation, all said five accused i. e. A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja, A5 Rajender Singh, A6
Gurdev Singh, A7 Varinder Singh and A8 Gurjant Singh were, deceitfully, intentionally and by corrupt means, trying to leave India in terms of conspiracy with others. They were neither army officials nor they could have ever applied for any official passport. A4
Navneet Singh acted as agent and procured passengers i. e. A5 Rajender Singh, A6 Gurdev Singh and A8 Gurjant Singh. It was also found that the sum of Rs.4.90 lacs were transferred by A4 Navneet Singh to the bank account of his co accused A3 David Johnson in lieu of obtaining such forged passports.
CHARGESHEET AND CHARGES 2.0 After concluding investigation, a consolidated charge It was also simultaneously
sheet with respect to all the aforesaid six RCs was filed indicting all the aforesaid eight accused persons. claimed that investigation on certain points was still pending and permission was sought to further investigate the matter u/s 173 (8) Cr. PC. 2.1 It was also mentioned in the chargesheet that no
sufficient evidence could be found against Brigadier H. P. S. Bedi and Smt. Harleen Chadha. They were thus not sent up to face trial. 2.2 Such charge sheet was filed in the court on 12.05.2008
and vide order dated 20.4.2009 cognizance was taken. 2.3 It will also be pertinent to mention that two
supplementary charge sheets were also filed by CBI. 2.4 One such supplementary charge sheet dated
30.10.2008 is limited in nature as by virtue of the same, sanction orders along with record. 2.5 Thereafter, one more supplementary charge sheet was report of GEQD were sought to be placed on
filed in the court on 10.8.2010 which primarily pertained to investigation related to recovery of 44 passports from the house of A1 and also regarding 5 missing official passports of one previous Chile visit of army band. and no criminality recovery As regards 44 passports, CBI concluded the factum of mere that the same had been merely kept by A1 at his house for future use could be attributed from of such passports. Even as regards second aspect, CBI
concluded that there was not sufficient evidence except the disclosure made by one suspect against the other. 2.6 framed. 2.7 A1 Accused M. Suresh Babu was charged for offences u/s Vide order dated 31.8.2009, charges were ordered to be
419, 420, 467, 468, 471 R/w 465 IPC and u/s 13 (2) R/w 13 (1) (d) Prevention of Corruption Act and u/s 12 of Passports Act. Remaining accused A2, A3, A5, A6, A7 and A8 were also separately charged u/s 419, 420, 471 R/w 465 IPC and u/s 12 Passports Act. 2.8 Simultaneously, all the eight accused persons were also
charged u/s 120 B R/w 419, 420, 467, 468, 471 R/w 465 IPC, u/s 12 of Passports Act and u/s 13 (2) R/w 13 (1) (d) PC Act. All the accused pleaded not guilty and claimed trial.
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WITNESSES FOR PROSECUTION 3.0 Prosecution was directed to adduce evidence and has
examined 43 witnesses. Witnesses can be classified as under:Witnesses related to IGI Airport. (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v) PW6 Pawan Kumar, Counter Supervisor at Air India, IGI Airport, Terminal-II, New Delhi. PW7 Harish Kumar, Customer Agent at IGI Airport. PW17 Amit Kumar, Customer Agent at IGI Airport. PW32 S. T. Norbula, Assistant General Manager at IGI Airport, Air India Terminal, New Delhi. PW 15 Bhanu Prakash Joshi, Boarding Officer at IGI Airport. Witness from Ministry of External Affairs (i) (ii) (iii) PW18 Smt. Suresh Rani Sharma, Assistant PW19 Surjit Som, Section Officer in in the PV-II Section, Passport Office, MEA, Patiala House, New Delhi. PV-II Section, Passport Office, MEA, Patiala House, New Delhi. PW39 Pawan Kumar, Under Secretary in the PV-II Section, Passport Office, MEA, Patiala House, New Delhi. Witnesses from Hotel Airport Inn. (i) (ii) PW9 Ram Prakash Chauhan, Manager in Hotel Airport Inn at Mahipal Pur on 31.10.2007. PW10 Deepak Singh, Manager in Hotel Airport Inn
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Witnesses related to issuance of E-tickets. (i) (ii) PW12 Yogesh Kumar Bhardwaj, Managing Director of M/s Sunrise Airways Pvt. Ltd. PW13 Neeraj Handa, agent for M/s Sunrise Airways Pvt. Ltd. and E-tickets in question were booked through him. Important Army Officials. (i) PW11 Brig. H. P. S. Bedi. He was posted as Dy. Director General (Ceremonial and Welfare Department) Army. Headquarters, New Delhi. (ii) (iii) (iv) (v) PW14 Lt. Col. K. S. Chadha. Directorate, AG Branch. PW16 Swapan Kumar. PA to Brig. H.P.S. Bedi PW21 Col. K. S. Ram Mohan. Headquarters as Director, CW-II. PW33 Lt. Col. Adesh Pal Singh Randhawa. He was posted as Joint Director at Army Headquarter, R&W Section, New Delhi. (vi) PW 20 Vijay Mohan for proving element of conspiracy He was posted at Army He was posted at CW-2
Witnesses who were impersonated and in whose name, five of the accused persons were attempting to travel abroad by using forged passports. (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) PW1 Vikram Singh. PW2 Anil Kumar. PW3 Jasbir Singh. PW4 Jagtar Singh.
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(v)
PW5 Sher Singh. Other army officials.
(i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v) (vi) (vii) (ix)
PW22 Ashok Kumar Barua. PW23 Tapan Kumar Maity. PW24 Gagan Lama. PW25 Hav. Amarjeet Singh. PW27 Rajender Singh. PW28 Devinder Singh. PW29 Ranjeet Kumar. PW37 Aji Kumar.
(viii) PW34 Girish Kumar U.
Witness to seizure of passports from the house of A1 M. Suresh Babu. (i) (i) G.E.Q.D. (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v) PW40 Nripendra Mohan Prasad Sinha, Addl. SP. PW41 Inspector Anand Sarup. PW42 Assistant GEQD R. S. Rana. PW43 Brigadier S. D. Nair competent authority to grant sanction with respect to prosecution under PC Act qua A1 PW38 R. Swaminathan, competent authority to grant sanction with respect to prosecution under Passports Act PW26 Subedar Mohammad Aslam Ansari. Bank witness PW36 Vikas Joshi. Investigating officers, sanctioning authorities and
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qua all accused. Public witnesses (i) (ii) (iii) PW30 Sukhdev Singh. PW31 Roshan Lal. PW35 Surjeet Singh.
DEFENCE VERSION AND WITNESSES FOR DEFENCE 4.0 All the accused in their respective statements u/s 313 Cr.
PC pleaded innocence. 4.1 As far as A5, A6 and A8 are concerned, they have taken
similar stand. They all have denied being part of any criminal conspiracy. According to them, they were to go to Germany on work permit and their co-accused Navneet Singh i. e. A4 had assured about obtaining such work permit. They claimed that they had not purchased any E-ticket and rather when they reached Airport on 01.11.2007, they all were detained. 4.2 They all, in no uncertain terms, implicated their co
accused A4 Navneet Singh by claiming that they all had been misled by him that they would be sent abroad on genuine work permit. They all denied knowingly possessing having any forged passport or user thereof. They claimed that they didnt know anything about their other co-accused persons. 4.3 As far as A7 Varinder Singh is concerned, he too has
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claimed that he was not holding any official passport and when inquiries were made from him, he also told at Airport that he was not army official. According to him, he had not purchased any ticket and did not secure any boarding pass either. He claimed that he had He also claimed gone to the Airport as per the instructions of one Lakhvinder who had assured that all travelling documents were legal. Raja. 4.4 A4 Navneet Singh has pleaded his complete ignorance that all such passports were in possession of A2 Nagarajan Israel
about the present case. According to him, he was called in CBI office where he had seen one Sandeep Singh. He also claimed that he had been falsely implicated in the present matter. 4.5 A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja has also pleaded his innocence He admitted
and has claimed that he has been falsely implicated. had asked him to reach Airport on 01.11.2007. one passport by Surjeet.
that he had gone to Airport that day but according to him, Surjeet His four other coaccused A5 to A8 were already present there and then he was given When he saw that passport, he noticed that it was in the name of Anil Kumar and he confronted Surjeet on said issue on which Surjeet claimed that nothing would happen as it was containing his photograph only. He pleaded that he did not know that such passport was official passport meant for army official and claimed that it was Surjeet who was paid Rs.50,000/- and it was Surjeet who had given him that passport. He also denied purchasing any E-ticket.
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4.6
A3 David Abraham Johnson has also claimed that he has
been falsely implicated. He claimed that one Mr. Sandeep was his boss and he booked one room for him and Mr. Sandeep gave him call that there was some problem and asked him to go underground. He also claimed that whatever amount was deposited in his bank had been deposited by Mr. Sandeep and he did not know any of his co accused. 4.7 A1 M. Suresh Babu admitted that he had visited Germany to participate in International Music Festival at Berlin. He, however, claimed that he was musician and was not working in the office of CW-1 but was in Rajputana Riffles. He denied that he had filled or signed any of the application forms. He denied that he had taken any such application form to the passport office or signed any receipt from the passport office. He also denied that he had got any had been made passport prepared for Ms. Harleen Chadha or handed over to her. When it was asked as to why the present case against him. He answered as under: "I do not know as to why this case has been made against me. I had gone to Germany as part of the music team. At the time of return, I was with Subedar Gurdev Singh, Lt. Col. Adesh Pal Singh Randhawa, Havaldar/Clerk Raeji. I was told to have an eye upon Subedar Gurdev Singh by Col. Randhawa. returned to India. We Same evening, I do not know what
transpired but I, along with Subedar Gurdev Singh and Havaldar Raeji were put in quarter guard i.e. custody. We all were kept separately in custody for one week. me only. Then some inquiry was initiated and I found that it was directed against I, however, always claimed that I did not know
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anything about the present matter and was not involved in anything. Initially, I was told that I would be let off in one or two week but matter went on for quite some time and even I was not allowed to meet my family. After one year or so my mother died and then I virtually started quarrelling as to why I was being detained for so long then I was taken to CBI office and falsely implicated in the present matter. I was only good musician and I did not know anything about the procedure related to passport etc. I feel that I have been falsely implicated in the present matter by Brig. H.P.S. Bedi, Col. Satinder Singh and Lt. Col. Chadha. I never was given any application form for taking the same for passport office. I never filled any such application form. I never collected any passport. There was rather a separate team in the Army for such purpose and I was not part of any such exercise." 4.8 All accused except A1 desired to lead evidence in defence. DW1 and DW2 entered into witness box on behalf of A5, A6 and A8. No other witness was examined by any of the accused. CONTENTIONS OF STATE 5.0 Ld. PP has contended that prosecution has been able to
prove its case to the hilt. 5.1 He has contended that there is evident and discernible league with one another.
conspiracy amongst the accused persons and that it is very much palpable that all the accused were in Army officials as well as the officials of MEA were having blind faith in
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A1 who took unjustifiable advantage of such trust reposed in him and dared to forge signatures of Col. Satender Singh. He obtained blank official passports from MEA and filled those and the 10 passports, which were meant for reserved band members and which were not ultimately going to be utilized at all, were misused by him. Five such passports were found in possession of A2, A5, A6, A7 and A8 when they were caught at IGI Airport on 01.11.2007 and remaining were recovered from his house later on. He has also argued that A1 came into contact of A2, A3 and A4. A4 arranged A5, A6 and A8 and obtained money from them and also transferred a sum of Rs.4.90 lacs to the bank account of his co accused A3. It has also been argued that the sketchy cross examination of some of the important witnesses also indicate that accused never disputed the authenticity of the case of prosecution. He has also contended that A5, A6 and A8 have categorically indicted A4 Navneet Singh as the person who had duped them which fact also lends reassurance to the correctness of the prosecutions version.
DEFENCE CONTENTIONS 6.0 All the aforesaid contentions of the prosecution have
been refuted by the defence. 6.1 Sh. Rakesh Malhotra, counsel for A1 M. Suresh Babu, has
contended that A1 has been made a scapegoat. According to him, neither A1 had filled up any form nor had he forged signatures of
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anyone. 6.2 According to him A1 was only a musician in Rajasthan
Riffles and was not in the office of CW-1. His name was admittedly in reserved list earlier but he was asked to report and to participate in the Music Festival and had gone to Germany but he had never filled any application form for preparation of official passport of anyone and never forged signatures of any one. According to him, some blank applications for passports were given to him by some of the applicants and these application forms were given by him to Subedar Ashok Kumar Barua for necessary processing and A1 did not do anything further at all. After he returned from Germany, he was detained by army officers and then after one year he was handed over to CBI. He also claimed that senior army officers were let off and he, being a petty official, has been implicated. 6.3 Sh. Kulvinder Singh had defended A4 and A7. As regards
A7, he has contended that there is nothing on record to show that he had ever cheated anyone or even attempted to cheat anyone. He does not dispute that A7 was present at IGI Airport that day but his mere presence cannot invite inference to the effect that he was part of any conspiracy or that he had cheated anyone. According to him, A7 had gone to IGI Airport as per instructions of Lakhvinder, the agent and he was never told that he was supposed to travel on any forged passport. It has also been argued that there is nothing to show that A7 had impersonated anyone or was holding any forged passport or that attempted to use such passport. According to Sh. Kulvinder Singh, A7 had not even arranged any E-ticket and when he
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reached at the airport, he was immediately apprehended. He has also challenged the investigation which according to him is biased and tainted. 6.4 As regards A4, it has been argued that there is no
material whatsoever to infer that he was part of any conspiracy. He has also argued that prosecution has miserably failed to show that A4 had transferred any money to the account of A3. It has also been argued that neither the concerned photographer has been examined nor the witness from concerned hotel has indicted A4 and therefore, A4 cannot be hauled up merely on surmises and conjectures or on the basis of statements of co accused. According to him, A5, A6 & A8 have indicted him due to some other issue and A4 had never taken any money from them. 6.5 6.6 Sh. S. N. Pandey has defended A2 and A3. As regards A2, it has been argued that there is no fact
suggesting his involvement with any other co-accused. Photo-studio official has not been examined and hostile testimony of PW 20 clearly demolishes theory of conspiracy as PW 20 has failed to say anything against A2. According to him, his presence at Hotel a night before does not stand proved and CBI has also failed to establish that ETickets were arranged by him. He has also expressed astonishment over bias investigation and unwarranted interference in investigation by Director, CBI and according to him Surjeet and Neeraj Handa should have been also made accused besides some senior Army officials. He has stressed that A2 had no role in preparation of any
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forged passport. 6.7 As regards A3, he admits that he had an account with
ICICI branch but deposit in such account had not been made by any co-accused. Rather, it was made by one Sandeep Singh and Karamjeet Singh and, these two persons were deliberately left out from the scope and ambit of investigation. According to him, conspiracy cannot be presumed whimsically merely because one room was booked by him at Hotel Airport Inn when CBI has failed to prove presence of any other accused at such room. 6.8 Sh. Paramjeet Singh has also tried to shield A5, A6 & A8.
He has contended that contradictory versions of Airport officials have confused the scenario and it cannot be said that they had any occasion to use passport. He has argued that rather A2 and A4 had brought all three of them to Airport from Hotel and they were given passports only when they had taken position in the queue and they never had any opportunity to see whether the travel documents were genuine or not. He has contended that all three of them had no knowledge as to what had been already done by their co-accused. According to him, they all three are rather victims and should not have been made accused. He has also claimed that Sh. Kulwinder Singh. Ld counsel for A4 and A7 was possessing the counterfoils of deposit slips of amount deposited in the account of A3 by A4. Such slips were seized during investigation and Sh. Kulwinder Singh must have obtained those from A4 and then the same must have been handed over to CBI and this fact, by itself, indicates that A4 had cheated these three accused and obtained money from them by
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deceit and then transferred such money to the account of A3. When they came at Delhi, they were given forged passports and they lost their money as well as prestige as they had to remain behind the bars. EVALUATION OF EVIDENCE 7.0 I have given my thoughtful consideration to the rival
contentions and vigilantly perused and scanned the entire material available on record. 7.1 A5 Five alleged impersonators are A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja, Rajinder Singh, A6 Gurdev Singh, A7 Varinder Singh and A8
Gurjant Singh. 7.2 As per CBI, these five accused persons were trying to flee
India by using forged passports. The following chart would show the relevant details:-
Sl. Name of accused No.
Passport no Exihibit No.
Official impersonated
Serial no. of such official in overall List/ serial no. in Reserved list
1 2 3 4 5
A2 Nagarajan
0117317 Ex PW2/C 1 (D140)
PW2Anil Kumar PW1Bikram Singh PW3 Singh PW4 Singh PW5Sher Singh
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46(4) 51(9)
A5 Rajender 0117320 Ex PW1/B Singh 4 (D139) A6 Singh Gurdev 0117320 Ex PW3/B 2 (D138)
Jasvir 47(5) Jagtar 50(8) 48(6)
A7 Varinder 0117320 Ex PW4/B Singh 7 (D142) A8 Singh Gurjant 0117320 Ex PW5/B 3 (D141)
7.3
Out of said five accused persons, it will be appropriate to
deal with A5 Rajender Singh, A6 Gurdev Singh, A7 Varinder Singh and A8 Gurjant Singh, at the moment. Role of A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja is somewhat aggravated as he is also alleged to be agent and material co-conspirator. 7.4 aspects:i) Whether they had conspired with their other co-accused persons or not? ii) Whether they had submitted incorrect particulars and had signed application forms for obtaining fake passports? iii) Whether they had used such official passports and whether they had cheated MEA officials, Airport officials and immigration authorities? Qua A5, A6, A7 and A8, let me weigh up following
7.5
There does not seem to be any dispute that for the
purpose of participation in said Music Festival to be held in Germany, a list was prepared and was sent to MEA and also to the Embassy of Federal Republic of Germany. Such list consisted of 52 persons. First 42 officials were in the main list and remaining 10 officials were in the reserved list. These names can be ascertained from Ex.PW39/A as well as from Ex.PW21/A.
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7.6 main list
By reserved officials, it means that these were to be used was unavailable for one reason or the other. Reserved
as standby or in case of emergency if any of the member in the Musicians were as under: 1) NK Devender Singh 2) NK Anil Pardhe 3) NK T. K. Maithy 4) NK Anil Kumar 5) LNK Jasvir Singh 6) LNK Sher Singh 7) LNK M. Suresh Babu 8) Sep. Jagtar Singh 9) Sep. Bikram Singh 10) GDR Praveen Kumar 7.7 It will be also important to mention here that one official
i. e. Lance Naik Hawaldar Amarjit Singh, whose name was in Main list, did not go Germany and in his place A1 M Suresh Babu, whose name was in Reserved List, visited Germany. 7.8 As per such list, it is very much apparent that names of
Jasvir Singh, Sher Singh, Jagtar Singh and Bikram Singh figure in reserved list. Of course, name of Anil Kumar is also in Reserved List. 7.9 Let me now see the passport application forms pertaining
to said four accused persons. These are as under: Sr. No. 1 Name of accused Application form A5 Rajinder (D51) Ex.PW1/A
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2 3 4
Singh A6 Gurdev Singh (D49) Ex.PW3/A A7 Varinder (D48) Ex.PW4/A Singh A8 Gurjant Singh (D50) Ex.PW5/A
7.10
PW1 Bikram Singh has deposed that he was posted in He also gave particulars of his family He deposed that he was never
Sikh Regiment and was attached with army band and Rajasthan Riffles in the year 2007. members and his address.
nominated by the army music band for participation in Music Festival in Germany and he had never applied for the passport either. He was shown application form Ex.PW1/A. He claimed that said form was neither containing his photograph nor his signatures. He also denied that it was containing his hand writing. When he was shown corresponding passport, he reiterated that even such Ex.PW1/B was neither bearing his photograph nor passport signatures. He
also claimed that he was never told by army that any such passport was issued in his name or that he was required to report at IGI Airport to board any flight on 01.11.2007. He also claimed that he had never purchased by E-ticket or obtained any boarding pass to travel from New Delhi to Frankfurt by Air India Flight. Virtually similar stand has been taken by PW3 Jasvir Singh, PW4 Jagtar Singh and PW5 Sher Singh. 7.11 I have seen the cross examination of these witnesses as that these four never applied for any passport and never
well and there does not seem to be any dispute prosecution witnesses
signed application forms. I have seen the application forms as well as

the corresponding passports and from the testimony on record, it can be safely inferred that these army officials had never applied for any official passport. These passports are not ordinary passports All the aforesaid four accused and are rather official passports.
persons i. e. A5 Rajinder Singh, A6 Gurdev Singh, A7 Varinder Singh and A8 Gurjant Singh are private persons and therefore, they are not entitled to official passport at all. Visa stamp is also there on all such four passports which bear the same scanned photograph as is there on the passport and the corresponding application form. 7.12 7.13 So far so good. However, prosecution does not possess any material to
show that application forms for obtaining official passports pertaining to said four witnesses were filled by these four respective accused and signed by respective accused. Rather, according to the own case of prosecution, all such application forms i. e. Ex.PW1/A, Ex.PW3/A, Ex.PW4/A and Ex.PW5/A were filled by A1 Suresh Babu and he had also forged signatures of Col. Satender Singh on all such application forms. Thus, even as per CBI, it was never felt that application Ex.PW1/A seeking passport in the name of Bikram Singh was filled and signed by A5 Rajinder Singh or that Application Ex.PW3/A (D49) was filled by A6 Gurdev Singh or that was filled by A8 Gurjant Singh. application Ex.PW4/A (D48) was filled by A7 Varinder Singh and application form Ex.PW5/A (D50)
26
7.14
Specimen hand writing
and signatures of all four
accused persons were taken during investigation. These were also sent to CFSL for necessary comparison also. Following chart would be very handy to appreciate report of Handwriting Expert:-
Sl. No. 1 2 3 4
Name of accused A5 Rajinder Singh A6 Gurdev Singh A7 Varinder Singh A8 Gurjant Singh
Specimen writing S-161 to S-165 S-166 to S-170 S-246 to S-257 S-171 to S-175
hand Questioned writing Q91, Q96, Q450 Q79, Q83, Q434 Q85, Q90, Q449
hand Q437, Q397,
Q74A, Q77, Q399 Q443,
7.15
All said specimen hand writing sheets are part of
supplementary documents. Questioned hand writing are those which appear in the application form and on the passport and as per the opinion of hand writing expert, which has been proved as Ex. PW42/B, it was found not possible to express any opinion whether the person who had written the aforesaid specimen hand writing also the author of the corresponding questioned hand writing. 7.16 This clearly means that there is nothing to suggest that was
these four persons had filled their respective application forms. Moreover, there is no witness to that effect either. I emphasis that this was not even the case set up by CBI. 7.17 I have carefully gone through the entire testimony on
record and I have failed to find out any material which may show that
these four accused persons i. e. A5, A6, A7 and A8, at any prior point of time, conspired with any other co accused person. A7 had allegedly reached Airport directly same day. Even if I assume for a moment that A4 Navneet Singh had brought A5, A6 and A8 to Delhi and even if it is assumed that they all had stayed in Hotel in Delhi a night before, that fact, by itself, cannot infer that A5, A6 and A8 were sharing conspiracy with A4 or for that matter with other accused persons.
7.18
It seems to me that they all merely wanted to go abroad
and had paid money for facilitating their journey. They wanted to have passport, visa and E-ticket and for that they might have shelled out hefty money but that does not mean that they were sharing any conspiracy, at larger level, with other accused persons. They were hardly concerned as to how such passports, visas and tickets were being arranged by others. Merely because, they wanted these things cannot be meant to understand that they were party to actual act of forging and were sharing common intention with others or that there was a common object in this regard. 7.19 Now let me see whether they were possessing
fake and forged official passports and whether they used such passports on 01.11.2007. 7.20 In this regard, I would straightway come to the testimony
of officials who were posted at IGI Airport that day.
28
7.21
PW6 Sh. Pawan Kumar was posted as Counter Supervisor
with IGI Airport, Terminal no.2. He deposed that case of five passengers were brought to his knowledge by his subordinate namely Sh. Harish Kumar(PW7) and Amit(PW17). Before minutely scrutinizing the testimony of PW6 Pawan Kumar, it will be useful to see the testimony of PW7 Harish Kumar and PW17 Amit Kumar. 7.22 PW7 Harish Kumar was working as customer agent with firstly Jasvir Singh (name of
IGI Airport and according to him,
passport holder is Jasvir Singh but it was allegedly used by A6 Gurdev Singh) came to the counter and on the appearance of the passport holder, he developed a doubt and asked about his identity card which such person was not able to produce. He then asked him about logo of army band which he refused to show claiming that he did not carry such logo on his clothes. According to Harish Kumar, he had a doubt whether such person was in fact an army personnel, therefore, he interrogated further but since he was not satisfied, he produced him before his counter supervisor. He also deposed that there were such 5 like persons who were present and he identified them correctly in the court. It would be important to mention that A7 Varinder Singh was not present in the court at the time of deposition and was exempted from appearance through counsel and his identify was not even disputed. According to Harish Kumar, he took all the five accused persons out of queue and handed over them to Sh. Pawan Kumar Bali. completely Most importantly, testimony of this witness is and uncontroverted. No question or unrebutted
suggestion was put to him by anyone. PW7 Harish Kumar was shown passports during deposition and he claimed that all such five
29
passports were shown to him. So much so, he even identified E Tickets. He deposed that he had checked such passports and E tickets that day as well. 7.23 PW17 Amit Kumar was also on duty along with Harish
Kumar that morning and according to him out of those five accused persons, three were standing in the queue in front of Sh. Harish Kumar and two accused persons were standing in the queue in front of his desk. Naturally, at IGI Airport one would come across various counters for checking in purpose and from the testimony of Amit Kumar it seems that three accused persons were in one row and two in the other row. that As per PW17 Amit Kumar, when Harish Kumar made inquiries from the accused persons, it was revealed there were five such like persons and the two persons, who were in the queue in front of his desk, then joined the three other persons and when they were asked to show identity cards, none of them could produce identity card and on the basis of suspicion, the matter was reported to PW6 P. K. Bali. Undoubtedly, this witness claimed that he could not identify those five persons and even CBI did not get perturbed and did not choose to cross examine him on the aspect of identification but fact remains that he has, emphatically, claimed those five persons joined together and when they were asked to show identity cards, they could not show the same. In cross examination, this witness, pursuant to one question, answered that these persons were apprehended at the time of issuance of Boarding passes. 7.24 Reverting back to the testimony of PW6 Pawan Kumar
30
Bali, he has deposed that when the matter was reported to him, he asked them to produce official documents to substantiate their produce any document except the official capacity, they failed to
passport. He also put certain questions to them about their place of posting, nature of job and official identity cards and since their reply was not found satisfactory, the matter was reported to Air India Security namely R. K.Vaid and Harish Masand and all the five passengers along with their passports, air tickets and complete baggage were handed over to the personnel of Air India for further necessary action without checking in i. e. without issuing boarding passes. and He also deposed that during the relevant time i. e. year 2007, boarding passes used to be generated from the computer manual boarding card were used to be issued only in emergency cases. 7.25 It is now required to be seen whether these five
accused persons including A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja were able to collect any boarding pass or not. 7.26 There is no absolute perspicuity with respect to such
aspect of the case. Prosecution has placed on record boarding passes. These are D12 to D16 and have been exhibited as Ex.PW6/A to Ex.PW6/E. These are manual boarding passes and not computer generated boarding passes and when these boarding passes were shown to the concerned prosecution witnesses, they categorically claimed that these were never issued by Air India. PW6 Pawan Kumar has claimed that none of these boarding passes were issued by any staff working under him that day. Even otherwise these were
31
incomplete as detail of boarding number, boarding time, gate and seat number are not found filled up. Similarly, PW7 Harish Kumar has deposed that these boarding passes were not filled up by him and during those days computerized boarding passes were used to be issued. PW17 Amit Kumar has also deposed that since there was a suspicion, the matter was brought to the notice of Sh. Pawan Kumar Bali in order to see whether boarding cards were to be issued to these passengers or not. 7.27 I would also like to mention that PW32 Sh. S. T. Norbula
was also posted at IGI Airport as Assistant General Manager. He was partly examined on 29.11.2010 but thereafter he was not produced and his sketchy examination, even otherwise does not serve any purpose. 7.28 passes. 7.29 In order to find out the real story behind such boarding Thus, it is, if truth be told, not understandable as to what
prosecution wanted to show by placing on record such boarding
passes, I had to see statements u/s 161 Cr. PC and when I went through statement u/s 161 Cr. P.C. of PW6 Pawan Kumar Bali, it was discovered that in his such statement, he had categorically claimed that boarding passes were not issued and these boarding passes (Ex.PW6/A to Ex.PW6/E) appeared to be dummy boarding cards prepared to establish the presence of the passengers at Air India check-in counter. No such fact was stated by P. K. Bali in witness box and even the prosecution did not try to get the aforesaid fact clarified
32
when Pawan Kumar Bali deposed before the court. 7.30 Be that as it may, fact remains that the testimony of
PW6 Pawan Kumar, PW7 Harish Kumar and PW17 Amit Kumar categorically indicate that during that period, boarding passes used to be computer-generated and not manually and all the boarding Meaning thereby, these passes Ex.PW6/A to Ex.PW6/E have not been categorically issued by them or by any staff working at the Airport. checking-in. 7.31 Naturally, the question of issuance of boarding passes Since at the time of checking-in, the officials at the were never issued by the concerned officers of Air India at the time of
would have arisen only when credentials of the passengers were established. counter developed suspicion, the matter was immediately referred to the supervisor and since none of the passengers could give any satisfactory reply and failed to show their identity cards, they were detained for further necessary action. Naturally, in such a situation, there was never any occasion to have issued any boarding pass. At the time of such checking-in, simultaneous with the issue of boarding passes, luggage is also checked in and tags are issued for such luggage. It becomes very much apparent since immediately a suspicion had arisen, all such five persons were isolated and were questioned and therefore, they were not given any boarding pass at all. Luggage tags were also not issued. Thus the boarding passes contained in D12 to D16 which have been exhibited as Ex.PW6/A to Ex.PW6/E are not strictly speaking boarding passes which are issued by concerned airway after having satisfied the credential of any
33
passenger. I also cannot rule out the possibility that these might have been sort of dummy passes filled for assistance of counter officials. Naturally, someone from the side of accused would have filled the same. CBI did not find it prudent to send these to GEQD for obtaining report. Who knows, it might have filled by any of these five accused. 7.32 I would here also like to make reference to departure These also bear signatures of concerned five
cards which are D143 to D147 and these are, unfortunately, not proved by anyone. accused persons but prosecution has not taken any pain to prove these documents and also the stage when such departure cards were required to be filled and prepared and therefore, I am left with no option but to exclude departure cards from the scope of present discussion. On careful perusal of statements of witnesses recoded u/s 161 Cr.P.C, I realized that one Discrepancy form was also filled at the Airport at Boarding counter by Assistant Manager (Security) Sh. RK Vaid. PW BP Joshi had made reference about the same during investigation but surprisingly, such Discrepancy form was not made part of the record. It would have also fully established as to when exactly, the impersonation was detected. Sh. R.K. Vaid was not cited as witness and testimony of PW 15 Sh. Joshi cannot be read being incomplete. 7.33 The testimony of aforesaid airport officials would,
however, indict that all such five accused persons were in the queue and were in the process of checking in for catching flight. 7.34 These passports are not ordinary passports. These are
34
white passports as these are popularly known. Since counter officer saw these white passports i.e. official passports, he, at once, asked for identity cards from the passengers. In such a situation, standing in queue for obtaining boarding passes and showing passports and E tickets becomes a very crucial and decisive factor. They failed to produce their official identity card and could not give any satisfactory reply to establish that they were army officials. PW6 Pawan Kumar has categorically deposed that they failed to produce any document except the passport. Naturally, when they must have appeared PW7 Harish Kumar has also such E-tickets before the counters and were in the queue they all were having their passport with them besides E-tickets. categorically deposed that accused persons had brought electronic tickets, too, with them. So much so, he deposed that (D18) of passenger Bikram Singh, i. e. Ex.PW7/1 (D17) pertaining to passenger Anil Kumar, Ex. PW7/2 Ex.PW7/3 (D19) of passenger Jasvir Singh, Ex.PW7/4 (D20) of passenger Jagtar Singh and Ex.PW7/5 (D21) of passenger Sher Singh were also produced by accused persons along with their passports. 7.35 It clearly indicates that all such five accused persons
including A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja were having their respective passports with them. All such passports were official passports. These were containing their photographs but rest of the particulars were, from top to bottom, incorrect. 7.36 I am not prepared to accept that these five accused had not even seen the passports and that had no occasion to use the same. A bare perusal of the passport would have revealed that it was official passport and except for photograph, ever fact mentioned
35
therein related to identity of passenger was untrue. If any person pays hefty amount for obtaining passport, visa and E-tickets, he would immediately see the particulars mentioned on the passport and a casual glance would have revealed that except the photograph, nothing else was correct. incorrectly. Even the name has been mentioned Naturally, the names were as per the reserved list but
the photograph was of the accused. 7.37 It really does not matter much whether these five
accused were standing in one queue or two queues. Stand of prosecution witnesses, in this regard, is found consistent from inception. Clinching point is flashing of passports and E-tickets for procuring Boarding Passes. I am mindful of the fact that in two passports D140 and D141, there are immigration stamps as well. Normally question of immigration should arise after check-in was successful. However, this does not create any sort of ambiguity in the case. Rather, it establishes that accused were perhaps able to even by-pass hurdle at check-in counter. 7.38 Sh. Paramjeet Singh, counsel for A5, A6 and A8 has
contended that none of the complainant of police FIRs has been examined. He has also wondered as to how the boarding passes, passports etc were seized by CBI as no memo has either been prepared or proved. I am of the view that since investigation in toto had been transferred from Delhi Police to CBI, CBI got the entire record automatically. These documents were already there in the police file and once charge was assigned to CBI, it got custody of entire file including documents and, therefore, there was no
36
requirement of preparing any formal seizure memo. Undoubtedly, only one FIR recorded by Delhi Police has been got proved whereas same Duty officer i.e. PW8 SI Subey Singh could have proved all the FIRs, he being duty officer in all the cases but lacuna appearing in this regard cannot take apart the entire case. It also really does not matter even if A5, A6 and A8 were brought to IGI Airport by A4. A5, A6 and A8 are themselves are to be blamed for using gorged passports. Had their intention other than malafide, they would not have dared to stand in queue to obtain boarding passes. Their standing in queue rather reflects their knowledge and willingness to use such passports as genuine passports. 7.39 Sh. Kulvinder Singh, counsel for A7 Varinder Singh has
argued that there is nothing to show that accused Varinder Singh was possessing any passport much less a forged official passport. He has also contended that there is no TIP and therefore, even otherwise the identification before the court for the first time has no value in the eyes of law. I am not impressed with such contention at all. I need not reiterate that PW6 Pawan Kumar, PW7 Harish Kumar and PW17 Amit Kumar have categorically claimed that all such accused persons had produced their passports. PW6 Pawan Kumar has categorically deposed that when accused were asked to show official documents, they could with only show the passport and reply given by them was not satisfactorily and all such passengers along passports, air tickets and baggage were handed over to Air India Authorities for further necessary action. 7.40 Undoubtedly, PW6 Pawan Kumar did not point out
37
towards any accused and did not make reference to any of such passport but PW7 Harish Kumar has categorically identified all such passengers. A7 Varinder was, at that time, represented through his counsel and fact remains that his identity was not disputed. Now, in such a situation, defence counsel cannot claim that case is liable to fail for non-holding of TIP. Moreover, he has also forgotten the fact that TIP is required when a person flees after committing any offence. Here, the airport officials had isolated these five persons and then were handed over to security and in such a situation there was no requirement of holding of any TIP. Most importantly, the testimony of PW7 Harish Kumar is completely unrebutted and uncontroverted and, therefore, defence cannot agitate regarding identity and use of passports. Undoubtedly, PW17 Amit Kumar has supported the case of prosecution but he also claimed that he did not remember their faces as more than two years had elapsed but when this witness was cross examined, he categorically deposed that it was correct that such accused persons were apprehended before the issuance of boarding passes. His evidence gives full corroboration to the case of prosecution and shows that private persons had impersonated as Army officials and had flashed official passports. I would also like to mention that even the testimony of PW6 Pawan Kumar is completely unchallenged and therefore, keeping in mind the testimony of all the five army officials in whose name such official passports were meant to be as well as the testimony of airport officials, it leaves no doubt in my mind that all such five persons including A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja were knowingly and consciously possessing forged and fake official passports and attempted to cheat the airport authorities by using the same.
38
7.41
As far as A5 Rajinder Singh, A6 Gurdev Singh, A7 are concerned, I have not they had As per the in
Varinder Singh and A8 Gurjant Singh
been able to find out any material which may show that they were concerned with preparation of forged passports or conspired directly. with any other accused for said purpose.
admitted case of prosecution, A7 Varinder Singh had come to airport There is nothing to suggest that A7 had ever come contact with any other accused at any prior point of time. Thus, A5 to A8 cannot be said to be in conspiracy with other remaining accused persons. They merely wanted to go abroad on work permit. It is not unusual to observe that youth of affluent and agriculturally rich state of Punjab is always fascinated and obsessed for abroad. They are always desirous of living abroad and settling there. They dont mind spending and paying through nose for such purpose. They are also least concerned as to how their agents ultimately get them such travel documents. They are least concerned about any forgery which might have been committed by their agents or any other illegal act committed by them. To haul them up for larger conspiracy related to forgery of signatures of Col. Satinder Singh would be a very fanciful thinking. In L.K. Advani and Ors. v. Central Bureau of Investigation 1997 CriLJ 2559, it was held that for proving conspiracy, the prosecution has to prove meeting of minds for commission of offence. It is true that each conspirator need not take an acting part in commission of each and every one of the conspiratorial act as was held in State of Himachal Pradesh v. Krishan Lal Pardhan and Ors AIR 1987 SC 773. However, even in said case of Krishan Lal Pradhan (Supra), Supreme Court held that
39
meeting of mind was essential to constitute an offence of conspiracy. Factum of proving the meeting of mind and factum of entering into a conspiracy has always been a daunting task. Apex Court, in the case of Kehar Singh and Ors. v. State (Delhi Administration) AIR 1988 SC 1883, observed that conspiracy can be proved by circumstantial evidence as well as by direct evidence and that though the conspiracy is hatched in secrecy, the prosecution must prove some physical manifestation of agreement although it may not be necessary to prove actual meeting of two persons or the words by which the two persons communicated. If this principle is applied, it would become comprehensible that there is no circumstantial evidence or direct evidence showing meeting of minds between these accused with other co-accused for commission of offence of forgery. The meeting of mind of A5 to A8, if any, is shown to have been for the purpose of traveling together and nothing more. 7.42 Be that as it may, it becomes very much clear that all five passports as
accused persons including A2 Nagarajan Israel Raja had knowingly, deliberately and dishonestly used forged and fake genuine passports. They were not triumphant in their design as they were immediately caught. However, they reported at the counter with E-tickets and flashed their passports which completed the act of cheating. It really does not matter that they were nabbed and were not able to catch the flight. They cheated airport authorities and they used forged passports as genuine and impersonated as army officials. As per sec 3 of Passports Act, no person shall depart from, or attempt to depart from, India unless he holds in this behalf a valid passport or travel document. None of said accused possessed
40
valid passport. 7.43 Resultantly, A5 to A8 are hereby individually held
guilty and convicted u/s 419, 420 and u/s 471 IPC as well as u/s 12 of Passports Act. Involvement of A4 Navneet Singh 8.0 (i) (ii) Now let met come to the role of A4 Navneet Singh. He was instrumental in arranging three passengers, namely, A5, A6 & A8. These accused persons were got photographed at B.K. Photo Emporium, R.K. Puram, New Delhi and at that time other two accused persons, namely, A2 & A3 were also present. (iii) A4 was in league with main perpetrators and had transferred a sum of Rs. 4.90 lacs in the account of his co-accused A3 David Abraham. (iv) When A3 had booked a room in hotel Airport Inn, Mahipal Pur, Delhi on 31.10.2007, A4 had also visited that hotel and had met A2 & A3 and had brought A5, A6 and A8 to Delhi. 8.1 Learned PP has stated that in addition to the aforesaid
These are the broad allegations against him:-
circumstances, statements of his co-accused A5, A6 & A8 also help the case of prosecution as they have, in no uncertain terms, stated before the Court that they all had been duped by Navneet Singh who
41
had assured to send them abroad on work-permit and hefty amount was paid to him for arranging such work-permit. According to learned Prosecutor, such statements of co-accused can definitely be used against A4 Navneet Singh. 8.2 Let me now see whether these allegations have been duly substantiated by the prosecution or not. 8.3 As regards photographs, prosecution was heavily relying He was owning M/s B.K.
upon the statement of PW Balbir Gupta.
Photo Emporium, Shop No. 7, Sector-8 Market, R.K. Puram, New Delhi and during investigation, he had revealed that A2 had come along with A5, A6 & A8 and he had taken their photographs. This witness has not graced the witness box. Summonses were sent to him but summons returned unserved. However, if his version u/s 161 Cr.P.C. is accepted as it is, then it would reveal that he has not made even a whisper regarding A4. He merely claimed that photographs of A5, A6 & A8 were taken in his studio. These three persons were brought to his studio by A2. 8.4 I am indeed not able to understand as to on what basis, This would have been
investigating agency was able to decipher that these photographs were clicked at M/s B.K. Photo Emporium. photographs. possible if there was any sort of stamp of studio on the reverse of the No such fact has been claimed by the investigating officer. No negative was collected from M/s B.K. Photo Emporium. No proof regarding payment was either obtained and even the bare stand taken in statement u/s 161 Cr.P.C does not take the case of prosecution anywhere. The manner of identification during
42
investigation is not in good taste and leaves much to be desired. Moreover, according to Balbir, his staff had clicked such photographs. Nobody knows name of any such staff official either. Still, as I have already noticed above, PW Balbir Gupta has not graced the witness box, this fact does not stand proved at all. 8.5 Now I come to the fact regarding booking of room of
hotel Airport Inn and meeting of A4 Navneet Singh with his coaccused in said hotel. In this regard, prosecution has examined only one important witness i.e. PW9 Ram Prakash Chauhan. He was working as Manager in said hotel and was on night duty on 31.10.2007. Register D-122 was shown to him and he claimed that such register was of their hotel and the entry at page no. 105 was in his hand and as per serial no. 1525, on 31.10.2007 one Mr. David A. Johnson i.e. A3 had come at hotel at about 10.00 PM and got a room booked in the hotel on the pretext that his bosses would come from Jallandhar and would stay there and accordingly room no. 305 was booked. Accused David A. Johnson had signed the register at point A400 and such register has been proved as Ex. PW9/A. He further deposed that accused David A. Johnson had brought three persons there and when asked to identify, he pointed out towards A2 & A4 i.e. accused Israel Raja and Navneet. However, witness was not found very sure, as in his examination itself, he has deposed that they might be the persons who had come that day. He was naturally found very tentative and uncertain and when he was cross-examined by the defence, he reiterated that he was not completely sure whether A3 & A4 were the same persons and he also stated that he had identified them as they were stoutly built. In his further cross-
43
examination, he deposed that he could not identify any of the person. In such a situation, it would be hazardous to hold that A4 Navneet Singh was present in the hotel that night. 8.6 Let me now come to the all important and most
crucial transaction i.e. transfer of a sum of Rs. 4.90 lacs allegedly by A4 in the account of A3. 8.7 There is no dispute that A3 is having a bank account with
ICICI Bank, Connaught Place and his account no. is 000705021330. Even A3 admits such fact. According to prosecution, a sum of Rs. 4.90 lacs was transferred in the said account of A3 by none other than A4. Prosecution has relied upon two sets of documents in this regard. One set of documents consist of D-26 (Main List) and these are three pay-in-slips and second set of documents is contained in D-17 to 28 (supplementary list of documents).
8.8
Let me first see the documents D-17 to D-28 of
supplementary list. If prosecution case is to be believed then A4 had deposited a sum of Rs. 4.90 lacs in Amritsar and such amount was transferred to the said ICICI Bank account of his co-accused David A. Johnson. As per case of prosecution, deposit was made in Amritsar and finally amount was credited in the bank account of A3 in Delhi. As I have already noticed above that there is no dispute that A3 is having said current account with Connaught Place Branch of ICICI Branch. Account opening form has been proved as Ex. PW36/A7 which contains photograph of A3 and his admitted signatures. A3
44
has also admitted such fact in his statement u/s 313 Cr.P.C. However, he has pleaded ignorance about the aforesaid deposit slips. Four pay-in-slips which ultimately remained with the bank are D-18 (Ex. PW36/A1), D-26, D-27 & D-28. Only one deposit slip i.e. pay-in-slip has been proved by prosecution. Remaining three pay-in-slips contained in (D-26, D-27 & D-28) are unproved. Let me, still, see and consider all these four pay-in-slips. First pay-in-slip contained in D-18 shows name of depositor as Karamjeet Singh. D-26 shows the name of depositor as Surjeet Singh and D-27 & D-28 show the name of depositor Sandeep Singh. Nobody knows as to who are these Secondly, it is not Karamjeet Singh, Surjeet Singh and Sandeep Singh. There is no investigation on this aspect at all. made clear by the prosecution as to on what basis it has come to the conclusion that such amount was deposited by A4 Navneet Singh only. Handwriting appearing on such pay-inslips were never sent to CFSL for necessary comparison with specimen or admitted handwriting of A4. Name of depositor is also not shown as Navneet Singh in any of the slips and, therefore, there is virtually no material on record to indicate that any such amount under any such slip was actually deposited by A4 through said slips which are banks copies. 8.9 It is a matter of common knowledge that as and when
any cash amount is deposited in bank, one part of the pay-in-slip is retained by the customer as customers copy. Out of these four payin-slips, three such customers copies were seized by the investigating agency during investigation. I am making reference to D-25 (Main List). It is seizure memo dated 26.04.2008 and these
45
three pay-in-slips (customers copies) were handed over to CBI by one Kulwinder Singh. 26.04.2008. I again say that seizure memo is dated This is important because charge-sheet was filed on
12.05.2008. Therefore, seizure memo is prior to the date of filing of charge-sheet. Prosecution did not bother to explain as to who is this gentleman known as Kulwinder Singh who had handed over those counterfoil/ customers copies to the investigating agency. 8.10 It baffled the court when learned counsel for A4 &
A7 disclosed before the Court that the persons mentioned as Kulwinder Singh is none other than he himself. He claimed that he had handed over those receipts to the CBI and at that time he was representing other accused persons also. There is indeed a big lapse on the part of investigating agency. They did not bother to record the statement of Kulwinder Singh. It should have been ascertained by the investigating agency as to how Sh. Kulwinder Singh had come in possession of such counterfoils of pay-in-slips. Naturally, these must be with the person who had deposited such amount in the account of A3 but investigating agency took the matter very casually and lightly and did not make any endeavour to investigate this aspect for complete substantiation of theory of deposit by A4 in the account of A3. So much so, seizure memo D-25 is lying unproved. No IO ever made any reference to such document. Seizing Officer is some Manjeet Singh but Manjeet Singh has also not been cited as witness and neither has been examined by the prosecution and, therefore, such seizure memo cannot be read in evidence. Similarly, all three pay-in-slips i.e. D-26, D-27 & D-28 have not been proved in any manner whatsoever. Nobody knows as to in whose handwriting such
46
pay-in-slips are and moreover mention of names of other persons like Sandeep Singh, Surjeet Singh and Karamjeet Singh has complexed the entire scenario and it cannot be conclusively inferred that it was A4 who had deposited such money. 8.11 Learned PP has, however, stated that Section 30 of
Evidence Act stands attracted and the statement made by coaccused can be read against the other. He has drawn my attention towards statements u/s 313 Cr.P.C. of A5, A6 & A8 who all have, in one voice, indicted A4 Navneet Singh as the person who had taken payment from them. I am, however, afraid that even such statements cannot be said to be of great importance as even otherwise there is no corroboration of any sort from anywhere else. Mere disclosure by any accused u/s 313 Cr.P.C. indicting his another co-accused would not be per se conclusive and sufficient. Section 30 Evidence Act provides that when more person than one are tried jointly for same offence, and confession is made by one of such persons affecting himself and his co-accused in the same case, the Court may take into consideration such confession as against the maker as well as against such co-accused. The basic principle behind this provision is that if a person makes a confession implicating himself, it would demonstrate that maker of confession is coming up with truth. In the present case, however, A5, A6 and A8 have not implicated themselves and, therefore, Section 30 Evidence Act does not stand attracted. Moreover, Section 30 Evidence Act only provides that confession of co-accused can be taken into consideration but scope of such consideration is not unlimited. It is rather very restricted. If a confession is made by one person implicating himself
47
as well as his co-accused, such confession can only be used to lend assurance to the other evidence against the co-accused. If there is no other legally admissible evidence against such co-accused, such co-accused cannot be convicted merely on the basis of confessional statement coming from the mouth of his accomplice. Such confessional statement made by his associate is obviously a very weak type of evidence and it does not even fall within ambit of evidence as contained u/s 30 of Evidence Act. Reference be made to HARI CHAND KURMI VS. STATE OF BIHAR AIR 1964 SC 1184 and MATTO SINGH VS. STATE OF HARYANA 2008 (4) AD CRL. 168. 8.12 I have seen defence evidence i.e. statements of DW1 They both have been
Mandeep Singh and DW2 Balbir Singh.
examined by A5, A6 & A8 and according to them, accused Navneet Singh had assured that A5, A6 & A8 could be sent to Germany and he demanded Rs. 8 lacs per person. DW1 Mandeep Singh has deposed that Navneet Singh assured that they would be sent on work-permit of Germany and genuine visa and also told that being relative, he was not going to deceive them at all. He has also deposed that Rs. 1 lacs for each such accused i.e. A5, A6 & A8 was given to him and then on 20.10.2007, further amount of Rs. 3 lacs each person was further paid and the balance amount of Rs. 4 lacs was to be paid on 30.10.2007. He also deposed that on 30.10.2007 at about 11.00 PM accused Navneet Singh took all of them to Delhi and then later on, a telephonic call was received from police that they all had caught and arrested. He also deposed that accused Navneet Singh had cheated all the three accused persons and had not even
48
returned their money. Testimony of DW2 Balbir Singh is also to the similar extent. These witnesses were grilled by counsel for A4 but they denied that they were deposing falsely at the instance of one Anoop Singh. I feel that even such testimony coming from the mouths of defence witnesses cannot be permitted to be accepted as substitute of prosecution evidence and as forceful and relevant. These are virtually the version of co-accused. 8.13 In view of aforesaid, though it is quite possible that A5,
A6 & A8 might have contacted A4 and might have paid money to him yet in view of the evidence on record, I am not able to hold so for want of sufficient legally admissible evidence. If A5, A6 & A8 feel that they have been duped by A4, they can always file a report or complaint in this regard with competent Authority or court of law. In the present matter, there is no legally admissible material connecting him with any other accused or showing meeting of minds or his physically meeting any of his other accused. 8.14 Resultantly, I have no option but to acquit A4 ROLE OF A2 AND A3 9.0 Let me now see the role of A2 and A3 and also as to how
Navneet Singh of all the charges.
they came into contact of A1. 9.1 Talking about A2, naturally, A2 was present at IGI
Airport. He had also used forged passport and cheated by impersonating as Army official i.e. PW2 Anil Kumar. Let me see
49
whether his role is limited to that or expanded further. 9.2 (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v) 9.3 Allegations against him are as under:He was co-conspirator and knew A1. He was possessing forged passport and used the same as well. He had brought A5, A6 and A8 at Studio and their photos were later on handed over to A1 for affixation on passports. He was present at Hotel Airport Inn. He purchased E tickets. Prosecution was heavily dependent upon the statement
of Sh. N.K. Vijay Mohanan who claimed, during the investigation, that A1 knew A2 but, unfortunately, he has not supported the case of prosecution. PW20 Sh. N.K. Vijay Mohanan was posted in Army Band, Delhi Cantt, New Delhi. He deposed that he knew accused M. Suresh Babu who was also posted in Army Band. However, thereafter he Here, I demolished the prosecution case claiming that he did not know A2. He rather claimed that he knew one David Suresh Babu. would like to observe that he is naming David Suresh Babu who was earlier in Army Symphony Band and was in Madras Regiment. This name ought not to be confused with David Abraham Johnson. These are two different personalities and should not be considered to be a case of any typographical error either. During investigation too, this witness talked about David Suresh Babu and not David Abraham Johnson. 9.4 This witness was very important for prosecution because
he could have supplied the linkage between A1 on one hand and A2 on the other hand but this witness resiled from his previous
50
statement and denied knowing anything about A2. He was grilled by the prosecution with the permission of the Court but he remained adamant to his stand and denied meeting A2 Raja in Church. 9.5 Another allegation against A2 is to the effect that he had
taken A5, A6 & A8 to M/s B.K. Photo Emporium where their photographs were taken and such photographs were then handed over to A1 M. Suresh Babu. whatsoever. 9.6 Regarding his presence at Hotel Airport Inn, again, I have already noticed above that prosecution has not been able to prove such fact in any manner
as already noticed above, PW9 Chauhan has not been able to identify him properly. 9.7 However, there is one more aspect showing
complicity of A2 i.e. procurement of E-tickets.
Fortunately,
such fact has been proved by the prosecution and in this regard testimony of PW12 Sh. Yogesh Kumar Bhardwaj and PW13 Neeraj Handa is of great significance. PW12 is Managing Director of M/s Sunrise Airways Pvt. Ltd and according to him, anyone could purchase air tickets from their company or through their travel agent. He deposed that in the present case, air tickets were issued to five passengers through travel agent i.e. M/s Metro Travel and Sh. Neeraj Handa is one of the owners of M/s Metro Travels. 9.8 PW13 Neeraj Handa has also supported the case of He has deposed that in the year 2007, one person,
prosecution.
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namely, Anil Kumar @ Raja had come to his office and asked for air tickets for five persons including himself for the destination from Delhi to Frankfurt and from Frankfurt to Mumbai and also from Frankfurt to Berlin and from Berlin to Frankfurt. Such person Anil Kumar @ Raja also claimed that he was government servant and some officials had to attend a function in Berlin and he had to proceed there along with other officials. According to PW12 Neeraj Handa, that person Anil Kumar @ Raja then gave him photocopies of passports and visa whereupon he (PW13) went to M/s Sunrise Airways and obtained air tickets and handed over the same to Anil Kumar @ Raja. Such E-tickets were shown to the witness during recording of his testimony and he identified such tickets Ex. PW7/1 to Ex. PW7/5. Original passports of such persons were also shown to the witness and witness admitted that photocopies of visa and photocopies of such passports were also given to him by accused Anil Kumar @ Raja. When he was asked to identify accused Anil Kumar @ Raja i.e. A2, it was noticed that accused Raja was not physically present in the Court that day but his counsel did not dispute his identity. obtained by none other than A2. This clearly indicates that there is no disagreement that such E-tickets were This witness was also shown photograph of such accused on passport D140 i.e. Ex. PW2/C and from such passport, he was able to identify the accused and categorically claimed that he was the same person who had come to book and collected the tickets. In his cross-examination, he claimed that he had given bank statement to CBI in order to show that payment was made by accused Raja and then such payment was credited to M/s Sunrise Travels. Surprisingly, counsel for accused Raja did not choose to cross-examine the witness and, therefore,
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testimony of PW13 Neeraj Handa clinches the issue in favour of prosecution and it stands established that five E-tickets in question were booked by A2 and at that time A2 was even holding all the five fake official passports and he had even given the photocopies of passports and photocopies of visas to Neeraj Handa. All such etickets were also identified by PW12 Sh. Yogesh Kumar Bhardwaj. 9.9 Sh. Pandey has, however, come up with a very novel
argument. He contends that since tickets were purchased by agent Neeraj Handa and he had made payment to M/s Sunrise Airways, Mr. Handa should have been made accused. According to him, A2 himself never purchased tickets at all. I dont find any merit in such contention. Mr. Handa was merely owner of M/s Metro Travels and as agent of M/s Sunrise Airways made booking as per wishes of A2. His role was to provide tickets to the customers. He was shown passports and Visas. So much so, A2 rather claimed himself to be a government employee and sought to book tickets for some official function. Merely because, tickets were booked through M/s Metro Travels, no criminality can be attributed to such concern or to Mr. Handa. On the other hand, categoric, unshaken and virtually unrebutted testimony shows involvement of A2. His false misrepresentation and his holding forged passports is a clear pointer to his being a partner in crime. 9.10 Sh. Pandey has further contended that even PW 35
Surjeet should have been made co-accused. I have carefully perused the testimony of this witness and I am of the considered opinion that his testimony rather strengthens the case of prosecution against A2.
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He deposed as under:I know accused Nagarajan who was known as Raja and he used to come to our office since 2002-2004 and he used to come for booking of tickets. I was suffering from skin disease and I had discussed my problem to him and he brought medicine for me from various places. We started meeting and developed a sort of friendship. I had been to his place with my wife also. Once he told me that a group was to go Germany in 2007 and he told me that he could arrange any person of my choice to become part of that group. Vijay Pal Singh @ Vicky is son of chachi of my wife and he suggested name of one Varinder Singh of Punjab. I told his particulars of Varinder Singh to Raja. Raja then demanded passport of Varinder Singh and two passport size photograph and advance Rs. 1 lac. Raja had demanded Rs. 6.5 lacs in all for said purpose. However, I had told Vijay Pal Singh @ Vicky that total expenditure would be of Rs. 7.5 lacs. I gave passport, photographs and advance of Rs. 1 lac in August to Raja. He asked me to wait for two months. On 31.10.2007 I was told by Raja that the work had been done and asked me to call that Varinder Singh. I called Varinder Singh at my house. Varinder Singh had come along with two more persons. I can identify accused Varinder Singh. (Accused Varinder Singh is exempted from personal appearance for today and his identity is not in dispute). Then I took them to one hotel at Mahipal Pur. Varinder Singh had to catch flight next morning. Then on 01.11.2007 I took Varinder Singh from said hotel to IGI Airport. There I met Raja and two
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other persons whom I cannot identify. They were in black coats. I left Varinder Singh at Airport and left. Same morning at 6.30/6.40 AM I got call from Raja that they had been detained at the Airport. I got afraid and I also left my house and did not go back to my house for approximately six months. Varinder had to make the balance payment of Rs. 5.5 lacs but he claimed that he would make the payment only when he was able to land in Germany and as a surety for time being, I gave four cheques from my Standard Chartered Bank as guarantee to Raja. Raja kept those cheques and agreed to send Varinder and also assured that he would return my cheques once Varinder landed in Germany and once he got the balance amount in cash. Raja had also told that once Suresh Babu was also working with him. However, I never met him. 9.11 Thus testimony of PW35 Surjeet Singh is found to be very
significant. It unquestionably indicates that A2 was in the thick of things since very beginning. He dropped hint that anyone could be sent Germany on substantial payment and demanded money i.e. Rs. 6.5 lacs. He collected photograph etc well before actual forgery. He called them at Hotel of Mahipalpur on 31.10.2007. According to Pw 35 Surjeet Singh, said Raja i.e. A2 was also present at hotel that evening. This fact remained unchallenged and rather proves presence of A2 at Hotel that evening. This rather makes up the loss emanating out of shaky identification by PW9 Chauhan. 9.12 I have already scrutinized testimony of Airport officials and the discussion done there stands good for A2 as well. Sh. Pandey cannot be permitted to dig out any mileage due to non-examination
55
of any official of Immigration or Airport Security. According to Sh. Pandey, it is not clear as to who recorded statements u/s 161 Cr.P.C. of Airport officials as IOs are coming up with contradictory versions and, therfore, it should be automatically assumed that these statements are prepared statements. I dont agree with him on this front either. In such type of bulky matters, it is not always possible for any IO to distinctly remember as to statement of which particular witness was recorded by him. Uncertainty or even giving incorrect answer in this regard would not mean that all such statements are prepared and fabricated statements. 9.13 It has also been argued that IO deposed that Hotel
register contained signatures of A 2 as well but when confronted he denied said fact and it indicates some manipulation. Again, Sh. Pandey is stretching himself too far and too away. When IO was shown the register, he immediately corrected himself and admitted that such register did not contain signature of A2. 9.14 My foregoing discussion would reveal that A2 has
committed offences u/s 419, 420 and u/s 471 IPC as well as u/s 12 of Passports Act for being in possession of forged passport and for using the same in fraudulent manner. But, in addition to that, he is party to larger conspiracy. He knew about Germany visit in advance. He possessed forged official passports and visas which automatically reflects that he was working in league with A1 else how could he lay his hands upon such official passports. PW 35 Surjeet Singh also implicates him. He was the one who had arranged E tickets.
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He demanded money for sending person abroad in an illegal manner. His asking for money shows his malafide intention. 10.0 Coming to A3, prime-most allegation against him is to
the effect that he had booked a room in hotel Airport Inn at Mahipal Pur, New Delhi where, allegedly, other accused had also stayed. Other momentous allegation against him is to the effect that he was holder of ICICI Bank account in which the money had been transferred in by impostor-accused persons. 10.1 10.2 Let me deal with aforesaid two aspects one by one As regards booking of hotel, let me straightaway come to
the testimony of PW9 R.P. Chauhan. He was on duty in the night-shift of 31.10.2007 and has proved the relevant Guest Register i.e. D-122. It was shown to him during deposition and he admitted that such register belonged to their hotel and entries on page no. 105 from serial no. 1518 to 1525 were in his hand. As per entry at serial no. 1525, one Mr. David A. Johnson son of Sh. Perumal resident of G-124, Wazirpur Colony, New Delhi had come to that hotel at about 10.00 PM and got a room booked on the pretext that his bosses would be coming from Jallandhar and would stay there. Accordingly Room No. 305 was booked for him and accused David A. Johnson signed such register. Relevant page of such register has been proved as Ex. PW9/A and signatures of David A. Johnson are at point Q-400 in token of booking. Mobile Number and PAN Number of David A. Johnson are also found mentioned. According to PW9 R.P. Chauhan, accused David had come with three persons and one of those three persons
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had given visiting card of one hotel Hey Day Jallandhar. Room was vacated next morning at about 5.30 AM and rent of Rs. 1500/- was paid by David A. Johnson. It would be pertinent to mention here that there is no cross-examination of this witness by A3. Undoubtedly, when this witness was grilled by other accused, he deposed that he could not identify such David A. Johnson but fact remains that prosecution possesses one very decisive and clinching evidence suggesting that such room was booked previous night by none other than by David A. Johnson. I am referring to the report of handwriting expert. PW42 Sh. R.S. Rana, Assistant Government Examiner of Questioned Documents in CFSL, Shimla examined the documents and with respect to signatures appearing at point Q-400, he opined that person who had signed on S-238 to S-245 had also signed point Q-400. S-238 to S-245 are specimen handwriting of accused David A. Johnson which were taken on 24.04.2008 by IO Sh. M.N.P. Sinha and these specimen signatures have been collectively exhibited as Ex. PW42/Z17. I have seen the testimony of PW40 Sh. M.N.P. Sinha and in examination-in-chief, regarding his astonishingly, ever taking he nowhere or made any reference signatures specimen
handwriting of A3 David A. Johnson. Prosecution also did not find any necessity of extracting such imperative fact from his mouth but fact remains that there does not seem to be any real quarrel in this regard. When statement of A3 u/s 313 Cr.P.C. was recorded, he admitted that said room was booked by him. emphatically
Undoubtedly, he also claimed that he was working for one Mr. Sandeep and he had booked the room as he was asked in this regard by Mr. Sandeep but fact remains that he does not dispute that such room was booked by him and does not dispute his signatures at point
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A400. Reference in this regard be made to answer given by him to question no. 49 of statement u/s 313 Cr.P.C. 10.3 According to the case of prosecution, he was having
saving account with Connaught Place Branch of ICICI Bank. Such fact is also not in dispute. A3 has categorically admitted that it was his account. Account opening form has been proved as Ex. PW36/A7 I have which also bears his signatures as well as his photograph.
already noticed above that prosecution has not been able to show that it was accused Navneet Singh who had deposited the amount in the said bank account of A3. Fact, however, remains that substantial amount was actually deposited in his bank account. Onus, therefore, shifts on him to elucidate and enlighten as to who had deposited such account in his bank account because such fact has to be assumed within his special and exclusive knowledge. In his He, statement us/ 313 Cr.P.C., he baldly claimed that such amount had been deposited in his said bank account by Mr. Sandeep. Sandeep in any manner whatsoever. however, failed to prove and substantiate such theory about Mr. No suggestion in this regard was put to any of the witness either. So much so, he did not examine any witness in order to prove such fact regarding Mr. Sandeep. 10.4 According to the case of prosecution, a sum of Rs. 4.90
lacs had been deposited in his bank account. It is not a small amount and A3 cannot be permitted to casually deny such fact and cannot baldly blame Mr. Sandeep, a stranger to this court, for such deposit. Thus, prosecution has been able to prove two very crucial aspects against A3. He was the one who had booked the room at Hotel
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Airport Inn. He was the one in whose bank account a sum of Rs. 4.90 lacs was transferred/deposited and such amount was towards the illegal procurement of travel documents i.e. passport and visa and it has already been noticed above that passports so prepared were found to be forged passports. Undoubtedly, he himself had not filled any application form or had not accompanied A1 to Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) at the time of preparation of passports but by that time A1, A2 & A3 were sharing common object. I need not again remind myself that PW35 Sh. Surjeet Singh has categorically deposed that A2 had met him and told him that a group was to go to Germany in 2007 and that he could arrange any person of his choice and amount etc. was given to A2 in August 2007. 10.5 Thus participation of A3 stands established and it is
proved that he, too, was in league with A1. 11.0 Let me now see the complicity of A1. Sh. Rakesh
Malhotra has defended A1 M. Suresh Babu and has argued that A1 has been made a sacrificial lamb and has nothing to do with the present case. According to him, following points are required to be seen and assessed:-
i) Whether A1 was with Rajputana Rifles or CW-1? ii) Whether he had been assigned any job related to filling of application forms or obtaining of passports? iii) Whether he had filled any particular in any application or in any of the passports and had pasted any photograph on the passports? iv) Whether he was having any sort of connection with his coaccused?
v) Whether there was any conspiracy between him and his coaccused? vi) Whether any incriminating article had been recovered from his house search? vii) Whether there is any evidence showing that he had abused his official position?
11.1
Sh. Malhotra has taken me through the testimony of
witnesses examined by the prosecution and has contended that prosecution has miserably failed to show any of the aforesaid fact. 11.2 I am mindful of the fact that Col. Satinder Singh has not So much so, even his statement u/s 161 I feel that prosecution
graced the witness box.
Cr.P.C. was never recorded during the investigation and he was not shown any of the application forms. committed grave blunder with respect to such glaring omission. Prosecution wants the Court to believe that A1 had forged the signatures of Col. Satinder Singh. In such a situation, Col. Satinder Singh himself was the best witness to prove such a material fact. For utterly mysterious reasons, investigating agency, deliberately or otherwise, did not choose to examine Col. Satinder Singh. Faced with such illogical approach of investigating agency, let me see as to what other senior Army officials have to offer. 11.3 PW21 Col. K.S. Ram Mohan was posted as Director CW-II
and had visited Germany along with the team of 40 personnel. He has given narration of steps required to be taken when any such invitation is received. I need not go into minute details about such aspect but I would certainly hasten to add that the selection of
musicians for participation in such type of musical festival cannot be left to the whims and fancies of lowly ranked Army official. A Lance Naik is not in any position to have any existent say and to decide as to who would or who should participate in such music festival and who should not. Undoubtedly, inputs can always be taken from a musician but to hold that he was having the final say or that he was the deciding authority would be too fanciful to believe. According to PW21 Col. K.S. Ram Mohan, invitation for Germany visit was received from Indian Embassy in Germany sometime in June, 2007 and name of one Colonel, one Lieutenant Colonel were cleared along with 40 other personnel. He deposed that he knew accused M. Suresh Babu who was working in the office of CW-1. A1 was basically a musician and his services were taken as and when required. He was also shown list Ex. PW21/A and he deposed that persons mentioned at serial no. 1 to 40 were supposed to visit Germany and names mentioned at serial no. 43 to 52 were reserved members. He also deposed that he along with 51 officials was to proceed to Germany and he himself was the leader of the delegation that visited Germany for 30.10.2007 to 07.11.2007 for participation in 13th Military Music Festival, Berlin. He also deposed that name of M. Suresh Babu was in the reserved list but he visited Germany in place of one Amarjeet whose name had been deleted. 11.4 List of officials, who were supposed to visit Berlin, was According to prosecution, such signatures Such list was also sent to
prepared. Such list is Ex. PW39/A and it purportedly bears signatures of Col. Satinder Singh. were never put by Col. Satinder Singh.
Ministry of External Affairs for preparation of passports vide letter no.
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B/42496/Germany/AG/CW-1 dated 23.10.2007 and even on such letter D-29 (Ex. PW19/A), as per the case of prosecution, A1 had forged the signatures of Col. Satinder Singh. 11.5 I am not able to absorb that A1 would dare to forge
signatures of Col. Satinder Singh on such letter. According to PW21 Col. K.S. Ram Mohan, this letter does not bear signatures of Col. Satinder Singh but prosecution has failed to explicate as to what accused M. Suresh Babu was going to drive by forging signatures of Col. Satinder Singh on such a plain letter. After all, the list must have been prepared and approved by the senior officers and to ensure the participation of such military officials, in such music festival, officials passports were urgently required. 11.6 Let me assume, for a moment, that intention of M. Suresh
Babu was other than bona fide and he might have thought of preparing forged passports for reserved officials but prosecution has not been able to explain as to why M. Suresh Babu would forge signature of Col. Satinder Singh on letter Ex. PW19/A and also as to why he would forge his signatures on all the 52 application forms. 11.7 All the application forms were shown to Col. K.S. Ram
Mohan during recording of his testimony and he, point blank, claimed that none of the applications were bearing signatures of Col. Satinder Singh. He also denied the authenticity of the stamp affixed on such application forms. According to him, he is well-acquainted with the signatures and handwriting of Col. Satinder Singh and he had seen him writing and signing. However, as regards M. Suresh Babu, he
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deposed that he did not know as to who had authorized accused M. Suresh Babu to submit application forms for issuance of passports in the Ministry of External Affairs. When he was shown Ex. PW19/A which was containing an endorsement made by accused M. Suresh Babu to the effect that he had received 51 passports and visa note for Germany, he merely claimed that these signatures must be of accused M. Suresh Babu supplementing that he was not much familiar with the signatures of accused M. Suresh Babu. In his crossexamination, he admitted that though application forms did not bear genuine signatures of Col. Satinder Singh nor his official stamp yet passports were issued to officials and officials had visited Germany as well. As regards his own application, he admitted that he had filled up his application and gave the same to accused M. Suresh Babu for processing. There is nothing much further in his cross-examination. 11.8 PW33 Lt. Col. A.P.S. Randhawa was posted as Joint
Director with R&W Section of Army Headquarters, New Delhi. According to him, his official passport was got prepared by Lance Naik M. Suresh Babu i.e. A1 and according to him, backside of his application i.e. application Ex. PW21/A4 was filled up by M. Suresh Babu. Back portion i.e. Sr. no. 12 is meant for purpose of visit and the country to be visited on official duty and according to specific and categoric deposition of Lt. Col. Randhawa, such column was filled by none other than accused M. Suresh Babu. This witness was also shown Ex. PW19/A and he identified handwriting of A1 M. Suresh Babu even therein. In his cross-examination, he admitted that A1 was musician with Army Band but he also used to do some documentation work. He also deposed that he also used to see him
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working in C&W Section. It was suggested to him that he had sent some application forms for issuance of passports to Lance Naik M. Suresh Babu at the asking of Brig. H.P.S. Bedi. This suggestion itself indicates that accused M. Suresh Babu does not dispute that he was given possession of application forms. number of officers. According to Lt. Col. Randhawa, C&W was a large organization in which there were He also admitted that he had seen M. Suresh Babu writing while filling up the form of other persons also. He also admitted that Col. Satinder Singh was Director of CW-1 and he was overall in-charge of that trip and Col. K.S. Ram Mohan was the head of delegation. He also deposed that his passport was given to him by Lance Naik M. Suresh Babu. Such fact is unchallenged. 11.9 PW34 Girish Kumar had gone on Malaysian tour of the
Army Band and according to him, when official passports were required for said visit, similar type of letter was prepared for MEA. He, being Joint Director CW-1 at that time, had signed the same and such letter and relevant list was sent to Ministry of External Affairs for preparation of official passports. Such letter Ex. PW34/A (D81) and letter Ex. PW19/A are similar in format. Only difference is that Ex. PW19/A pertains to the visit of Germany and letter Ex. PW34/A pertains to tour of Malaysia. There is allegation of forgery with respect to Germany visit. However, even when music band was to go to Malaysia for participation in Kulalampur International Tattoo 2007, all the requisite formalities were carried out through A1 M. Suresh Babu and his handwriting and signatures are there in the similar manner on Ex. PW34/A also. Prosecution, naturally, wants to show that for all such types of visits, duties used to be assigned to A1 M.
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Suresh Babu and he used to take application forms to MEA and used to obtain official passport from MEA. According to learned Prosecutor, Army officials and officials of MEA were having blind faith in him as on previous occasions also, he had obtained official passports from MEA and, therefore, when the passports were to be prepared for Germany visit, A1 took undue advantage of the faith reposed in him and pasted photographs of private persons on the passports meant for reserved officials and sold them with the help of his co-accused persons. 11.10 I have carefully seen Ex. PW34/A as well as Ex. PW19/A
and from these two documents coupled with testimony of senior Army officers and handwriting expert, one thing can be safely deduced. Even if A1 was posted in Rajputana Rifles, his services used to be taken for preparation of passports. I must admire that he has a very neat hand and the handwriting appearing on both these documents i.e. Ex. PW19/A and Ex. PW34/A is same and identical in nature. In application Ex. PW19/A, there is endorsement at point Q2 to the effect that accused M. Suresh Babu had received 51 passports and visa note for Germany. There are signatures of M. Suresh Babu beneath such endorsement. Similar type of endorsement is found to be there in Ex. PW34/A vide which M. Suresh Babu had received 23 official passports and one diplomatic passport on 24.08.2007 meant for Malaysia visit. As per the report of handwriting expert, questioned handwriting tallied with the handwriting of A1 as appearing in specimen handwriting sheets S-1 to S-140. S-1 to S-140 are contained in D-2 (supplementary documents) and have been collectively exhibited as Ex. PW42/Z13 and A1 to A16 are admitted
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documents containing handwriting of A1 M. Suresh Babu which have been proved as Ex. PW42/Z11. A1 to A16 are application forms which were filled for the participation in Kualalampur Music Festival and these contain admitted handwriting of A1 M. Suresh Babu and according to handwriting expert, author of such specimen handwriting and admitted documents was also responsible for the questioned handwriting. 11.11 I would, however, lay stress on the point that no definite
opinion could be given with respect to alleged forged signatures of Col. Satinder Singh. 11.12 It would also be useful to make mention of testimony of
PW11 Brig. H.P.S. Bedi and PW14 Col. K.S. Chadha. Name of PW11 Brig. H.P.S. Bedi figures in the charge-sheet. He has not been sent up to face trial. In the year 2007, he was posted as Deputy Director General (Ceremonial & Welfare Department) and he had gone to Kualalampur, Malaysia leading delegation of Army Band Contingent for participation in International Band Tattoo 2007. He went on a diplomatic passport but it was later on found that he was not entitled to such diplomatic passport. According to him, his Personal Assistant Swapan Kumar approached accused M. Suresh Babu and A1 was handed over filled up application and later on he was given diplomatic passport. 11.13 There is no dispute to the fact that PW11 Brig. H.P.S. Bedi According to case of
was not entitled to diplomatic passport.
prosecution, A1 M. Suresh Babu misled him and procured diplomatic
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passport for him.
In this regard, to some extent, I feel that even
PW11 Brig. H.P.S. Bedi himself and his Personal Assistant are to be blamed for the goof up. I do not find any criminality in this regard on the part of M. Suresh Babu as PW11 Brig. H.P.S. Bedi himself had deposed that when he asked Suresh Babu whether some application was required for diplomatic passport, accused M. Suresh Babu pleaded his ignorance. He also deposed that rather his Personal This witness has also Assistant Swapan Kumar had told him that he could get diplomatic passport as he was head of delegation. clarified in his cross-examination that the Department of Ceremonial Function is headed by Adjutant General and below him was Director General (C&W) and then Additional Director General, then Deputy Director General and then Director (Ceremonial) and then Joint Director. He also admitted that Col. Satinder Singh was Director and Sh. K.S. Chadha was Joint Director at the relevant time. He also deposed that selection of names of the Army officials, who were to participate in such music festival, used to be made by the Inspector of the Army Band with the advice of Joint Director (Ceremonial). He also deposed that such passports were supposed to be received by Col. Satinder Singh or Col. K.S. Chadha. 11.14 I have also seen testimony of PW14 Col. K.S. Chadha. He
is also not directly related with the present controversy related to Germany visit. His wife Ms. Harleen Chadha was not in Army but she had also been provided with an official passport and according to prosecution, it was again done by A1 M. Suresh Babu. Fact, however, remains that such official passport was never used by her. It would be important to mention here that even Ms. Harleen Chadha was not
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sent up to face trial on the ground that there was not sufficient evidence against her. She and Brig. H.P.S. Bedi were interrogated during investigation as they both got passports to which they were not entitled to and according to CBI, these passport were made available to them by accused M. Suresh Babu. with the Germany visit. At the cost of repetition, I would say that these two officials have nothing to do PW14 Col. K.S. Chadha has also given hierarchy of officials in Ceremonial Department and he also admitted that accused M. Suresh Babu was a musician and was posted at Rajputana Rifles and according to him, list of officials going abroad used to be approved by Director General on the recommendation of Deputy Director General (Ceremonial). 11.15 From the testimony on record, it cannot be said that On
accused M. Suresh Babu was never entrusted with any job related to filling up of application forms or for preparation of passports. previous such types of visits, his services were utilized. 11.16 With respect to the visit of Germany also, he was asked
to coordinate. Naturally, names were not finalized by him but there does not seem to be any difficulty in holding that he had filled up applications of such officials. Such act, by itself, did not amount to any illegal or wrong act and was not absurd either. However, it is not made clear by the prosecution as to why he would forge signatures of Col. Satinder Singh on all the applications forms and also on the forwarding letter sent to MEA for preparation of official passports. It was an official invitation and there was political clearance from the concerned quarter and in any eventuality, such list had to be
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dispatched to MEA for issuance of official passports.
Col. Satinder
Singh has not graced the witness box and the report of handwriting expert does not give any definite opinion as to who had forged the signatures of Col. Satinder Singh and in such a situation, it cannot be automatically inferred that merely because these applications were brought to MEA by M. Suresh Babu, he and only he would have forged the signatures of Col. Satinder Singh. 11.17 He had come at the office of MEA and in this regard
testimony PW19 Surjeet Singh is of vital importance. He was working as Section Officer at Patiala House in PV-II Section, Ministry of External Affairs, New Delhi. He has given procedure of issuance of official/diplomatic passport. According to him, whenever there used to be large number of applications for the issuance of passport for the officials of Defence Ministry then officials of Defence Ministry also used to come to their office for helping in preparation of passports of the officials of their department. He was shown letter Ex. PW19/A and he admitted that such letter was received for issuance of passports and he had endorsed issuance of 30 passports and signed also and then such letter was given to dealing clerk i.e. Smt. Suresh Rani Sharma and 30 blank passports were handed over to defence officials for preparing the passports. In the next breath, he deposed that in the present case, probably such blank passports were given to accused M. Suresh Babu. After the passports were filled up there, such passports were checked by their staff and then those were produced before him for signatures and he had signed those passports. He admitted that Brig. H.P.S. Bedi was not entitled to diplomatic passport and to that effect, there was error on his part.
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He claimed that there was no specific instruction to hand over blank passport to staff of Defence Ministry for filling up of passport but such practice was there for last many years as Army officials were known for their integrity. He also admitted that identity cards were also required for issuance of passports but on some occasions, Army officials did not attach identity cards along with the application forms. In the present case, no identity card was attached with the application forms. He also admitted that photographs, which are attached with the application forms, are also required to be attested by gazette officer. He admitted that he had allowed applications for issuance of 30 passports that day and he could not say whether other 20 passports were issued or not. Defence has attempted to dig out a huge mileage out of the aforesaid fact. According to defence counsel, he had allowed only 30 passports and in such a situation, there was no occasion for accused M. Suresh Babu to have collected 51 passports. However, he has forgotten the endorsement made by accused M. Suresh Babu himself whereby he acknowledged having received 51 passports. 11.18 PW18 Smt. Suresh Rani entered into witness box but here
testimony remained incomplete and she was partly examined and was never produced thereafter and, therefore, her part examination cannot be read. 11.19 According to the case of prosecution, applications for
procuring official passports were filled by A1 and in order to drive home said vital fact, CBI is heavily banking upon the report GEQD. However, before adverting to such report, I would like to say that
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various other Army officials have not been able to positively confirm such fact. Reference be made to the testimony of PW33 Col. A.P.S. Randhawa and of PW34 Girish Kumar. PW33 Col. A.P.S. Randhawa deposed that front portion of the application had been filled by him in his own hand but backside of the application appeared to have been filled by Lance Naik M. Suresh Babu. Similarly, PW34 Girish Kumar has also deposed that handwriting on letter Ex. PW34/A (D-81) appeared to be of accused M. Suresh Babu. These witnesses were not very categoric and positive about handwriting. There are several other Army officials who have also tried to smash up the prosecution case by claiming that these application forms have not been filled by A1 at all. Reference be made to the testimony PW20 Vijay Mohan, PW22 Sh. A.K. Barua and PW24 Gagan Lama. forms. 11.20 As far as PW29 Ranjeet Kumar is concerned, he has There are few witnesses who are not aware as to who had filled such application
categorically deposed before the Court that application for issuance of diplomatic/official passport i.e. D-121 (Ex. PW29/A) was bearing his signatures and his photograph and such application for the issuance of official passport was got signed from him by accused M. Suresh Babu and its columns were filled in by accused M. Suresh Babu. There is no challenge to such deposition. Portion, which has been alleged to be written by accused M. Suresh Babu in said application D-121 has been marked as Q266 and Q269 and as per categoric report of handwriting expert, person who had written Q-266 and Q269 had also written S-1 to S-140 and A1 to A16. Thus, these handwritings categorically match with the handwriting of A1 M.
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Suresh Babu. 11.21 Sh. R.S. Rana has been working as Assistant GEQD in
CFSL Unit of Shimla for last more than 17 years and defence counsels have made futile and ineffective attempt to attack his report by claiming that Sh. Rana was not expert in the field of examination of handwritings. I have seen his deposition and considering the fact that he is posted in CFSL Unit as Assistant GEQD for more than 17 years and that in his career, he has examined thousands of documents, his expertise on the subject is beyond challenge and cannot be questioned. 11.22 There does not seem to be any dispute regarding his
handwriting being there on the application for official passports with respect to the previous visit of music band to Malaysia. PW34 Girish Kumar has categorically deposed that for Malaysia Trip which was from 27.08.2007 to 10.09.2007, 24 total persons had been selected and visited Malaysia. Record pertaining to said Malaysia visit has also been placed on record and the letter for issuance of passport was written by none other than Sh. Girish Kumar and accused M. Suresh Babu was the person who had been entrusted with the job of collection of passports and he had gone to the office of Ministry of External Affairs and had obtained one diplomatic passport and 23 official passports for said Malaysia visit of Army Band. 11.23 I have already made reference to the endorsement made I have also seen handwriting
by accused M. Suresh Babu regarding receiving of passport on Ex. PW34/A as well as on Ex. PW19/A.
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appearing at portion Q1 and Q2 of Ex. PW19/A and it needs no discerning eyes to note that handwriting style is distinctly evidently similar and even the expert had come to the same opinion and has opined that author of these questioned handwriting as well were by the person who had written specimen handwriting S-1 to S-140 and A1 to A16. S-1 to S-140 and A1 to A16 are handwriting of A1 only. S-1 to S-140 are contained in D-2 (supplementary list) and have been collectively exhibited as Ex. PW42/Z13. A1 to A 16 have been collectively exhibited as Ex. PW42/Z11 and these are the application forms which were also filled by accused while music band had gone to Malaysia to participate in International Tattoo in 2007. Thus, it becomes apparent that applications were filled by accused M. Suresh Babu i.e. A1. It also becomes evident that when the passports were prepared by MEA officials, all such 51 passports were collected by none other than A1 from the office of MEA. Reference be made to Ex. PW19/A where at portion Q2 accused M. Suresh Babu made endorsement regarding receiving of 51 passports and visa note for Germany. This happens to be the most crucial fact of the case. It clearly indicates that accused had submitted applications before MEA. It also seems to me that he had helped officials of MEA in preparing of passport as the handwriting in the passports is also found to be similar. Report of Handwriting Expert also confirms the same. 11.24 Undoubtedly, there is no material before me that it was
accused M. Suresh Babu who had forged the signatures of Col. Satinder Singh. Even the report of handwriting expert does not come to the rescue of prosecution in this regard. However, I cannot lose
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sight of the fact that it was A1 only who had produced these applications before the officials of MEA. applications would show that on some Bare glimpse of such of the applications,
photographs were of some other private persons and not of the concerned Army officials. A1 was integral member of Army Band and he had gone abroad on previous Army concerts and it would be hardly digestible that he would not be knowing such a vital fact more so when he himself was assisting the official of MEA in preparing passports. If his intention was not malafide, he would have immediately reacted and would have brought to the knowledge of his superior that something was suspicious and shady. He, however, did not retort at all and rather very calmly and coolly collected all the 51 passports. After he came into possession of such 51 passports, onus was on to him to have shown that he had handed over these 51 passports to his superiors or deposited the same with the office of Army. Nothing of that sort had been claimed by him and five of such passports, which were carrying photographs of private persons, were recovered from the possession of his co-accused on 01.10.2007. This clearly reveals that he himself was part of the conspiracy. Undoubtedly, officials of MEA were also at fault. They displayed complete laxity in preparing passports and virtually allowed an outsider to fill up the passports. Even if workload was heavy, it was absolutely wrong on their part to have entrusted the job to an outsider. When PW19 entered into witness box, he was shown one official passport (D-127), such passport was bearing stamp of Ministry of External Affairs but it was blank and unsigned one. Such passport Ex. PW19/DA is one of the documents relied upon by the prosecution. According to PW19, it was never seized by CBI from their office.
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PW19 came up with an unexpected and startling answer and stated that perhaps M. Suresh Babu had stolen such passport from office. If this was really so, MEA officials should have lodged some report/complaint regarding theft of passport. Nothing of that sort was done and in order to hide acts of their own negligence, officials of Ministry of External Affairs are trying to blame accused M. Suresh Babu by claiming that he might have stolen the passport which was never ever the case of prosecution. 11.25 It is also not comprehensible as to why CBI did not try to
interrogate accused immediately when the case had been assigned to CBI without any delay. CBI rather allowed A1 to remain in custody of Army for approximately one year and did not even formally arrest him when the challan was prepared & filed. CBI should have made thorough interrogation from this prime accused at the earliest available opportunity. According to case of prosecution and Army, house of accused M. Suresh Babu was searched and during such search, Army had recovered 44 passports. This is really intriguing as to why at the time of filing of supplementary charge-sheet, investigating agency concluded that no criminality could be attributed from mere recovery of passports from his house. It is also not made clear as to why all such 44 passports were never produced before the Court. As I have already noticed above, such recovery was effected by Army officials under the supervision of Major Deepak Srivastava. Major Deepak Srivastava has not graced the witness box. PW26 Sub. Mohd. Aslam Ansari was examined by the CBI and according to him on 11.11.2007 on the direction of Major Deepak Srivastava, he went to the house of accused M. Suresh Babu and
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accused M. Suresh Babu was in custody and he also accompanied them and then house of accused M. Suresh Babu was searched and relevant documents collected from search were brought to Raj Rifle Centre, Delhi Cantt. He deposed that on 14.11.2007 house of accused M. Suresh Babu was searched again. I take a little pause here. This is all what he has to say in his examination-in-chief. In his entire such examination, he did not bother to give the details of the documents which had been recovered from the search. He failed to assign any reason as to why when search had already taken place on 11.11.2007, there was requirement of searching the house all over again on 14.11.2007. After 11.11.2007, house of accused M. Suresh was locked and the keys were deposited with the Quarter Guard. In such a situation, second search becomes meaningless because the things were under the control of Army officials and there was every opportunity of planting any incriminating article. Thus, search dated 11.11.2007 and 14.11.2007 is found shrouded with mystery. Major Deepak Srivastava has not graced the witness box and there is no explanation as to why second search was done. Moreover, even as per the case of CBI, there was no criminality emanating from the recovery of such passports. 11.26 I have seen the deposition of sanctioning authorities.
PW38 R. Swaminathan was posted as Joint Secretary (Counselor Passport & Visa) and he was competent authority to grant sanction with respect to prosecution of accused persons for their prosecution under relevant sections of Passports Act. Such sanction order dated 12.05.2008 has been proved as Ex. PW38/A. Sanction of A1 M. Suresh Babu for prosecution under Prevention of Corruption Act was
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granted by PW43 Brig. S.D. Nair and he has proved the sanction as Ex. PW41/B. He has deposed that after careful perusal of entire record including statements of witnesses, Army Headquarter Report, Court of Inquiry, house search report, statements recorded by CBI and on the basis of allegations and circumstances, he accorded such sanction for prosecution of accused M. Suresh Babu. It has been argued by defence that any case instituted without proper sanction would fail as it amounts to manifest defect in the prosecution. It has also been argued that there has to be proper application of mind. Reliance has been placed upon MOHD. IQBAL AHMED VS. STATE OF A.P. AIR 1979 SC 677 and MAJOR SOM NATH VS. UNION OF INDIA AIR 1971 SC 1910. There is no dispute regarding the established principle of law but fact remains that I have not been able to find out any material which may suggest that sanction was given by any incompetent authority or without application of mind. Discussion of the matter by sanctioning authority with legal luminaries, before according sanction, will instead show that sanctioning authority took the task with utmost seriousness. It rather reflects extra application of mind not non-application. 11.27 PW40 Nripendra Mohan Prasad Sinha was entrusted with He has also deposed that accused M.
investigation of this case.
Suresh Babu was working as Lance Naik in Welfare and Ceremonial Directorate and was responsible for obtaining applications from the nominated officials for sending the same to MEA and he had taken such applications to MEA. He has also deposed that accused M. Suresh Babu, using his good office, obtained passports from MEA and filled in the details in such passports in his own handwriting and
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pasted, in some of the passports, photographs of other accused who were not members of Army Band and received 51 passports from MEA. He has also deposed that during investigation, he had seized all such five passports i.e. Ex. PW1/B, Ex. PW2/C, Ex. PW3/B, Ex. PW4/B and Ex. PW5/B. He has also given other vivid details of prosecution case and has proved the relevant documents as well. In his cross-examination, he admitted that as far as accused persons, other than A1 M. Suresh Babu, were concerned, they had neither prepared the passports nor pasted photographs on such passports. He has also admitted that there was no evidence to show that A4 and A7 had met A1 or A2. He claimed in his cross-examination that five separate complaints were lodged by Immigration Authorities against five accused persons and Boarding Passes along with respective passports were seized and such documents were forwarded to IGI Police Station and, therefore, there was no separate seizure memo prepared by Delhi Police showing seizure of passports. He also admitted that he did not seize any baggage tag during investigation and according to him, all the five imposters were apprehended at the Immigration Counter. Undoubtedly, he admitted that Brig. H.P.S. Bedi was not eligible to have diplomatic passport and similarly Ms. Harleen Chadha was not eligible to have official passport but he denied that his investigation was unfair and full of vested interests. He also admitted that Col. Satinder Singh was in-charge of CW-I and Col. K.S. Chadha was subordinate to Col. Satinder Singh and he was also responsible for supervision of foreign visits by the Army Band. He claimed that Brig. H.P.S. Bedi, Col. Satinder Singh and Lt. Col. K.S. Chadha were supervising the visit with active assistance of accused M. Suresh Babu. He also claimed in cross-examination that
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list of participants was prepared by accused M. Suresh Babu as to who was to go and who would not. However, I feel that he has stretched himself too far and too away. I have already noticed above that accused M. Suresh Babu could have only given suggestion but he was not the deciding authority in this regard. In his crossexamination, he also made reference to the statement of PW Suresh Rani Sharma who had claimed that 5-6 Army personnel used to come to office of MEA and used to fill up passports and used to paste the photographs. He claimed that he tried to ascertain the names of Merely such other officials but could come to know about the name of M. Suresh Babu only and could not pinpoint anyone other. because investigating agency could not lay its hands upon any such other Army official does not mean that even M. Suresh Babu should be permitted to go scot free. From the testimony on record, it becomes very much perceptible that he was the one who had filled up the application forms and had taken the same to the office of MEA and even collected 51 passports. He cannot wriggle out of his own endorsement made by him in this regard. 11.28 PW41 Insp. Anand Sarup had also done part investigation
and had filed supplementary charge-sheet after obtaining sanction. He has also deposed that he had seized personal belonging recovered from the house search of accused M. Suresh Babu which were already recovered by Army officials and these were seized by him vide memo Ex. PW41/C. These were handed over to him by Major Deepak Srivastava. He had seized relevant files from the office of MEA vide memo Ex. PW41/D. He had also collected the relevant documents pertaining to ICICI Bank.
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11.29
It is also important to mention that Court of Inquiry
proceedings were also initiated by Army Authorities against A1 but for reason best known to the investigating agency, the outcome of such proceedings was not brought to the knowledge of the Court. However, when I searched Internet and particularly the website of Armed Forces Tribunal, I came across one judgment dated 07.05.2012 passed by Armed Forces Tribunal Principal Bench, New Delhi in OA No. 729/2010 which reveals that by order dated 26.11.2010 the services of accused M. Suresh Babu were dispensed with u/s 20 (3) of Army Act read with Rule 17 of Army Rules. petition. Such order was challenged by accused M. Suresh Babu but Tribunal dismissed his
11.30
Keeping in mind the entire material available on record
and in view of my foregoing discussion, I am of the opinion that complicity of A1 M. Suresh Babu stands proved very clearly. Prosecution has been able to prove following facts qua A1 M. Suresh Babu. (i) (ii) Band. (iii) Army officials had faith in him and on previous occasions also when Army Band was to go to Malaysia and Chile, task was handed over to A1 M. Suresh Babu to fill up the application He was in Rajputana Rifles but his services were Being musician, he used to participate in Army used to be availed by Directorate of CW-1 as well. Band and had, on previous occasions also, gone abroad with Army
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forms of the selected Army officials and to take such forms to the office of MEA and to obtain the passports from MEA. (iv) With respect to participation in Army Band in 13th Berlin Military Band Festival, 42 names were shortlisted besides 10 reserved officials. A1 filled up application forms for obtaining official passports and the purpose of visit on all applications in serial no. 12 are found to be filled by him. (v) He was also given the task of taking all such filled applications to MEA for obtaining official passports. He met officials of MEA in their office situated at Patiala House Complex and since MEA officials also had trust in him, he was allowed to fill up relevant details even in the passports. (vi) At that time, he was possessing all the application All these applications are also found to be All these were forms including applications Ex. PW1/A, Ex. PW2/A, Ex. PW3/A, Ex. PW4/A and Ex. PW5/A. filled by none other than A1 M. Suresh Babu.
containing photographs of private persons and this automatically indicates that A1 was even possessing photographs of such five private persons which he got through A2 and A3. Such photographs were pasted in the passports and he even filled up the relevant columns in the passports as well without any murmur. He collected all such 51 passports and visa note for Germany from office of MEA on 25.10.2007 by making endorsement at point Q-2 in Ex. PW19/A. Official passports were also got prepared for 10 reserved officials and out of these 10 reserved officials, five passports were having photographs of private persons who are also accused herein and these five passports were ultimately recovered from the possession of five accused i.e. A2 & A5 to A8.
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(vii)
He never deposited these passports meant for
reserved officials with office of Army or with CW-1. Remaining five such passports were also recovered from his house search. It clearly indicates his malafide intention to use the official passports meant for reserved officials. (viii) Being in Army and being integral member of Army Band, he would have immediately come to know that the photographs on the passports or for that matter on the application forms were not of the concerned Army officials but despite that he did not bring any such fact to the notice of his superiors which in itself suggests that he misused the opportunity and ditched the faith reposed in him by the Army officials and MEA officials. (ix) Except A1 no other accused was in Army. Only A1 knew that Army Band had been invited to participate in Berlin Festival. PW35 Surjit Singh has categorically deposed that A2 had told him that a group was to go to Germany and A2 had also told him that one Suresh Babu was also working with him. This clearly indicates that A1 had joined A2 in order to execute his plan and similarly A3 was also made part of conspiracy who accordingly booked a room in hotel Airport Inn and stayed there with other accused and even money had been transferred in his account of ICICI Bank for facilitating illegal human trafficking.
11.31
A1 was public servant. He got occasion to possess blank
passports and to fill them being a public servant. He abused his official position and obtained pecuniary advantage for him and his coaccused and made available passports i.e. valuable things for his
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other co-accused i.e. A2 and A5 to A8. 11.32 effusive Purpose behind making conspiracy a crime is to curb power to do harm by acting in combination. The
encouragement and support which co-conspirators give to one another rendering object achievable which, if left to individual effort, would have been unattainable. I need not remind myself that conspiracy is hatched in secrecy and on most of the occasions, Court is compelled to draw inference with respect to hatching of criminal conspiracy. It is not always possible to have pinpointed, precise and tangible evidence suggesting conspiracy. It has to be drawn together from facts and attendant circumstances. The evidence led before the Court clearly indicates that A1, A2 & A3 were part of the larger conspiracy. The very agreement is the ingredient of the offence. It is not necessary that all the conspirators must know each and every detail of the conspiracy as long as they are co-participators in the main object of the conspiracy. There may be so many devices and techniques adopted to achieve the common goal of the conspiracy and there may be division of performances in the chain of actions with one common object to achieve the real end of which every collaborator must be aware and in which each one of them must be interested. There must be unity of object or purpose but there may be plurality of means sometimes even unknown to one another, amongst the conspirators. In achieving the goal several acts may be committed by some of the conspirators even unknown to the others. The only relevant factor is that all means adopted and illegal acts done must be and purported to be in furtherance of the object of the conspiracy. In Mohd. Khalid vs State Of West Bengal 2002 (2)
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ALD Cri 610, it has been observed as under:Privacy and secrecy are more characteristics of a conspiracy, than of a loud discussion in an elevated place open to public view. Direct evidence in proof of a conspiracy is seldom available, offence of conspiracy can be proved by either direct or circumstantial evidence. It is not always possible to give affirmative evidence about the date of the formation of the criminal conspiracy, about the persons who took part in the formation of the conspiracy, about the object, with the objectors set before themselves as the object of conspiracy, and about the manner in which the object of conspiracy is to be carried out, all this is necessarily a matter of inference. 12.0 Before concluding the matter, I would certainly
comment that investigation has been found wanting on following points:i. CBI has not even attempted to give any reason much less a plausible one as to why Col. Satinder Singh was not joined in investigation. After all, he was the one whose signature had been forged. Curiously, during investigation, he was not confronted with such alleged signatures. He should have positively denied such signatures to be his signatures. CBI left everything for deriving inference. It took specimen signatures of Col. Satinder Singh but that alone was not sufficient. Court wanted to hear from horses mouth but for fanciful reason, this gentleman has not been cited as witness. I called for case diary but failed to find any reference about col. Satinder Singh even
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there. Undeniably, court has ample powers and could have called him as court witness. But, it was felt that at the fag end of trial, it really would not have served the real purpose. To be candid, he should have come in open all by himself during investigation instead of shying away. He was heading CW-1. He was the one who must have finalized and cleared the names of all musicians. He was, if truth be told, accountable to some extent. Fact, however, remains that even if I had called him, he would have very conveniently denied his signing anywhere. CBI shirked from its responsibility and failed to question him when it mattered most. ii. Director, CBI is overall Incharge and has abundant powers to supervise the entire machinery. He cannot work as a mute spectator and should definitely intervene if investigation is below par but he should not dictate any further. iii. Complete list of Band Members, who left India and who returned from Berlin has not been placed on record. Who knows there might be a person or persons who travelled as Musician to Berlin but never returned? Same stands true for visit of Malaysia and Chile. Passports of all the persons who visited Berlin for said festival should have been seized. At least, photocopies should have been placed on record. It would have shown whether all other passports were filled in the hands of A1 or someone else. CBI failed to investigate properly in this regard and rather some of the seized passports were immediately released.
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iv.
As per PW 29 Ranjeet Kumar, he had visited Germany. But he also claims that initially, he was sent back by IGI Airport as there was some defect in his passport. Nobody knows as to what type of defect is he referring to? Interestingly, his passport was allegedly recovered from house search of A1 but such passport does not show that it was used for travelling to Germany at all. This is completely absurd. This would rather suggest that he was having two passports because, as per CBIs own case, he had visited Germany and participated in Berlin Festival. One on record does not bear any visa stamp at all. In such a confusing scenario, CBI should have placed on record all the passports used or copies thereof.
v.
Prosecution has not thrown light as to why A1 would commit forgery with respect to all 51 applications. If I have understood the case of CBI properly, his intention was to misuse the passports meant for reserved members. But CBI has not been able to answer as to why A1 allegedly forged signatures of Col. Satinder Singh on all 51 applications. No necessity was felt to investigate the said point.
vi.
In such type of matters, there has to be complete file with all the relevant notings. Such file, from Army Headquarter, has not been collected by CBI. Court does not know why? Such file would have shown as to who was calling the shots?
vii.
Any application seeking passport is required to be made in
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duplicate. Nobody knows where that other set is? CBI also did not make any endeavour to note that for such type of applications meant for official passports, copy of identity card and attested photograph are also required to be submitted. No investigation was made on that line either. File of MEA with complete notings was also never seized or produced before the court. viii. Case was quickly entrusted to CBI, but despite that CBI did not think it prudent to at least formally arrest and interrogate A1 in the present matter. As per chargesheet, he was never arrested in the present matter till filing of chargesheet though he was in custody of Army. In such a sensitive matter, it was very much required that his version was got ascertained as early as possible. Nothing of that sort has happened. His disclosure is also not there. ix. No attempt was made to ascertain the role of names appearing on Pay-in-slips of ICICI Bank. It was not attempted to ascertain as to who filled those slips. x. Customer copies of such Pay-in-slips of ICICI Bank were seized from Kulwinder Singh, advocate. These were very important documents but CBI took those very nonchalantly. So much so, it did not even record statement of Kulwinder Singh to the effect as to how he came into possession of same? A very crucial piece of evidence went begging, courtesy CBI.
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xi.
44 passports were allegedly recovered from house of A1. No reason has been assigned as to why most of those passports were hurriedly released and not made part of challan. Surprisingly as per supplementary challan, no criminality could be attributed merely because of such recovery.
xii.
Why no action was proposed against MEA officials who were apparently very much lax and negligent.
xiii.
No effort was made to ascertain as to who filled the Departure Cards at IGI Airport or the alleged Boarding Passes? No light was thrown regarding boarding passes either.
xiv)
Harleen Chadha got official passport whereas she was civilian. Unnecessarily, accused Suresh Babu has been made liable for her getting such passport whereas when list for visit to Malaysia was finalized, she was shown Lt. Col. Army number, meant for her, was also displayed in the list. She was also shown in the rank of Joint Director. Naturally, this could not have been done by A1 at all. PW34 Sh. Girish Kumar, the then Jt. Director CW-1 was responsible for preparation of list. He had signed the list as well as application form of Harleen. Resolute investigation could have nailed down actual culprit for said lapse.
12.1
Faulty investigation does not robotically mean that entire
case has to be consigned to dustbin. Defective investigation cannot become a basis of acquittal and it becomes the duty of the Court, in
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such a situation, to make the investigating agency wiser instead of letting the accused off the hook. 12.2 The conduct of Investigating Agency should not stand on
the way of evaluating the evidence in finding out the truth and if the material on record is otherwise realistic and ingenuous then such pedestrian investigation should not matter much as otherwise there would be failure in delivering substantial justice. In the case of imperfect investigation, the Court has to be circumspect in evaluating the evidence. But it would not be right in acquitting an accused person solely on account of the defect as that would tantamount to playing into the hands of the Investigating Officer if the investigation is designedly defective . Reference, in this regard, be made to RAM BALI VS. STATE OF UP 2004 CRI.L.J. 2490 and also to KARNEL SINGH V. STATE OF M.P (1995 (5) SCC 518). Here, I find that . investigation was defective but, I dont find the omission to be motivated or deliberate. 12.3 In the case in hand, lapse might be unintentional and,
therefore, investigating agency is warned in this regard and I express my discontentment on record. CONCLUSION 13.0 Thus, A1 is held guilty for committing offences u/s 120-B read with Section
punishable
419/420/465/467/468/471 IPC and 12 of Passports Act and Section 13 (2)/13 (1) (d) of Prevention of Corruption Act. However, I would certainly like to say that it does not stand proved
90
that he had impersonated Col. Satinder Singh or that he himself had forged the signatures of Col. Satinder Singh. He conspired with A2 & A3. Bogus passengers were got arranged in terms of conspiracy. A1 cheated MEA authorities and obtained passport from then by intentionally and deliberately furnishing incorrect particulars. He is also held guilty for all the aforesaid offences individually excepting sec 419 IPC. 13.1 Similarly, his accomplice A2 & A3 are also held
guilty for offences punishable u/s 120-B read with Section 419/420/465/467/468/471 IPC and 12 of Passports Act read with Section 13 (2)/13 (1) (d) of Prevention of Corruption Act. They are also held guilty for said offences individually barring Section 419 IPC and sec 13 (2)/13 (1) (d) of PC Act. It has, however, already been held that A2 was present at Airport and was actually possessing forged passport and used the same as well and for that he has been held liable for offences u/s 419/420/471 IPC and u/s 12 Passports Act. 13.2 A5 to A8 are, individually, held guilty and
convicted u/s 419, 420 and u/s 471 IPC as well as u/s 12 of Passports Act. They are not found to be part of any conspiracy. 13.3 A4 is acquitted of all charges. Bail bonds of A4 are
cancelled. His surety stands discharged.
91
14.0 convicts.
Case be now listed for arguments on sentence qua
Announced in Open Court July 13, 2012 (MANOJ JAIN) Special Judge (PC Act Cases) (CBI) South District: Saket Courts: New Delhi
92
CC No. 46/2011 CBI Vs. M. Suresh Babu etc. Tuesday, July 17 2012 Present: Sh. Jagbir Singh & Sh. Shiv Charan Sharma, learned Public Prosecutors for CBI. Convict M. Suresh Babu in person with counsel Sh. Rakesh Malhotra. Convict David A. Johnson & Nagarajan @ Raja in person with counsel Sh. Pandey. Convict Rajender Singh, Gurdev Singh and Gurjant Singh in person with counsel Sh. Paramjeet Singh. Convict Varinder Singh in person with counsel Sh. Kulwinder Singh. (A-4 Navneet Singh has already been acquitted). 1 2 Heard arguments on sentence. Learned PP has contended that all the convicts are required to and should be meted out harsh punishment.
be dealt with stern hand
According to him, convict M. Suresh Babu has shown audacity to defame entire Army by abusing his official capacity and by making forged official passports available to private persons. He also states that other convicts also do not deserve any mercy. 3 On the other hand, Sh. Malhotra has prayed that convict M.
Suresh Babu be given a chance to reform himself. He has reiterated that he is victim of circumstances and has been made scapegoat by senior Army officials. He has also contended that he remained behind the bars for approximately 26 months including one year when he was in the custody of
Army authorities. It has also been argued that he has a wife and five year old daughter who are totally dependent upon him. He has also lost his job and he should be given a chance of rehabilitate himself. 4 Sh. Pandey has prayed for taking lenient view qua convict David As far as convict Nagarajan is
A. Johnson and Nagarajan @ Raja.
concerned, it has been argued that he remained behind the bars for eight months and 19 days and his mother is eighty years old and his entire family is dependent upon him. As regards convict David A. Johnson, he remained in jail for 90 days and he has a sister who is physically and mentally challenged and his parents and family are dependent upon him. It has also been argued that they never misused liberty of bail during the trial either. 5 Sh. Paramjeet Singh, counsel for convicts Rajender Singh,
Gurdev Singh and Gurjant Singh has prayed that all these three convicts Rajender Singh, Gurdev Singh and Gurjant Singh have learnt a big lesson of their life. According to him, they are also, actually, the victims as they merely wanted to go abroad in search of employment and had no intention to travel of any forged document. Sh. Kulwinder Singh has also raised similar contentions for convict Varinder Singh. 6 I have given my thoughtful consideration to the rival contentions
and carefully perused the entire material available on record. 7 As far as convicts Rajender Singh, Gurdev Singh, Varinder
Singh and Gurjant Singh are concerned, I am conscious of the fact that they only wanted to go abroad and they were least bothered as to how such travel documents were made available to them. They are not found part of criminal conspiracy either. To some extent, they can also be called victims though fact
remains that they are themselves to be squarely blamed as they impersonated and knowingly used forged official passports for leaving country. They were, however, nabbed at the Airport itself. I am told that they all except convict Varinder Singh have spent around two months behind the bars during investigation. As far as convict Varinder Singh is concerned, he spent two weeks in jail. Since, he was found suffering from spinal injury, he was granted exemption from time to time during the trial as well. 8 However, as far as convict Nagarajan @ Raja is concerned, not
only did he try to travel on forged official passport but was also a key player in the larger conspiracy. 9 Convict David A. Johnson is found to be the apparent
beneficiary as the money had been transferred in his bank account and he was also instrumental in booking accommodation. 10 As far as convict M. Suresh Babu is concerned, he has tried to
smash and smear the good image of Army. He was the one who had got the official passports prepared and received such official passports from MEA and, therefore, it was his primary duty to hand over these official passports to the Army authority. However, his intention was other than bonafide and wanted to send private persons abroad through such official passports. I, however, cannot lose sight of the fact that there is no instance of his previous involvement of any nature whatsoever and his services have already been dispensed with u/s 20 (3) Army Act. 11 Justice demands that courts should impose punishment befitting
the crime so that the courts reflect public abhorrence of the crime. But, in its over-zealousness, court is not supposed to get swayed away. It has to be
wary of the rights of convict and then to assess whether to award retributive or deterrent sentence. 12 The principle of proportion between the crime and the
punishment is the principle of just deserts. For deciding just and appropriate sentence, the aggravating and mitigating factors and circumstances in which the offence has been committed are to be delicately balanced in a dispassionate manner. Such act of balancing is indeed a difficult task as there exists no straitjacket formula furnishing foolproof criterion to weigh up just and appropriate punishment as every criminal case has its own peculiarity. 13 Keeping in mind overall facts and circumstances of the case, I
sentence convicts Rajender Singh, Gurdev Singh, Gurjant Singh and Varinder Singh as under: (i) For offence u/s 419 IPC, they are sentenced to the period already undergone by them and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof SI for a period of one month. (ii) For offence u/s 420 IPC, they are sentenced to the period already undergone by them and fined Rs. 6000/- in default thereof SI for a period of one month. (iii) For offence u/s 471 IPC, they are sentenced to the period already undergone by them and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof SI for a period of one month. (iv) For offence u/s 12 of Passports Act, they are sentenced to the period already undergone by them and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof SI for a period of one month.
14
Convict M. Suresh Babu, Nagarajan Israel @ Raja and David A. (i) For offence u/s 419 r/w section 120B IPC, each of them is
96
Johnson are sentenced as under:
sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 5000/- each in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (ii) For offence u/s 420 r/w section 120B IPC, each of them is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- each in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (iii) For offence u/s 465 r/w section 120B IPC, each of them is sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 3000/- each in default thereof further SI for a period of two months. (iv) For offence u/s 467 r/w section 120B IPC, each of them is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- each in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (v) For offence u/s 468 r/w section 120B IPC, each of them is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- each in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (vi) For offence u/s 471 r/w section 120B IPC, each of them is sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 3000/- each in default thereof further SI for a period of two months. (vii) For offence u/s 12 Passports Act r/w section 120B IPC, each of them is sentenced to SI for two years and fined Rs. 5000/- each in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (viii) For offence u/s 13(2)/13 (1) (d) PC Act r/w section 120B IPC, each of them is sentenced to SI for three year and fined Rs. 25,000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of one year.
15
Convict M. Suresh Babu is individually sentenced as under: (i) For offence u/s 420, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (ii) For offence u/s 465 IPC, he sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 3000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of two months.
97
(iii) For offence u/s 467 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (iv) For offence u/s 468 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (v) For offence u/s 471 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 3000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of two months. (vi) For offence u/s 12 Passports Act, he is sentenced to SI for two years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (vii) For offence u/s 13(2)/13 (1) (d) PC Act, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 25,000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of one year. 16 under: (i) For offence u/s 419 IPC, he is sentenced to the period already undergone by them and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof SI for a period of one month. (ii) For offence u/s 420, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (iii) For offence u/s 465 IPC, he sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 3000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of two months. (iv) For offence u/s 467 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (v) For offence u/s 468 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months.
Convict is Nagarajan Israel @ Raja is individually sentenced as
(vi) For offence u/s 471 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 3000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of two months. (vii) For offence u/s 12 Passports Act, he is sentenced to SI for two years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. 17 Convict David A. Johnson is individually sentenced as under: (i) For offence u/s 420, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (ii) For offence u/s 465 IPC, he sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 3000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of two months. (iii) For offence u/s 467 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (iv) For offence u/s 468 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for three years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. (v) For offence u/s 471 IPC, he is sentenced to SI for one year and fined Rs. 3000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of two months. (vi) For offence u/s 12 Passports Act, he is sentenced to SI for two years and fined Rs. 5000/- in default thereof further SI for a period of three months. 18 19 All the sentences would run concurrently. Needless to say that all the convicts would be entitled to
benefit of Section 428 Cr.P.C. However, as far as convict M. Suresh Babu is concerned, he would be entitled to set off only with respect to
the period he spent behind the bars in connection with the present case of CBI. It is not possible to grant him benefit with respect to the alleged detention period of one year during Court Martial proceedings for the reasons that Legislature has used words same case and secondly there is no material whatsoever on record or brought by defence suggesting that his alleged detention was under Court Martial proceedings and the duration of such detention period. 20 A copy of judgment and order on sentence be given to all the
convicts free of cost. 21 All the convicts have also been made aware about the fact that
they have right to file appeal. 22 Ahlmad is directed to page and book-mark the file as per
the latest circular so as to enable digitization of the entire record. 23 File be consigned to record Room.
Announced in the open Court on this 17th July of 2012. (MANOJ JAIN) Special Judge (PC Act) (CBI) South Distt: Saket Courts: New Delhi
100

Judgement in Human-Trafficking Offences Allegedly Commited by Army Personnel

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Judgement in Human-Trafficking Offences Allegedly Commited by Army Personnel

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IN THE COURT OF MANOJ JAIN: SPECIAL JUDGE (PC ACT) (CBI) SOUTH DISTRICT: SAKET DISTRICT COURTS NEW

DELHI CC No. 46/2011 RC RC RC RC RC RC SI82007E0006-EOU-IV SI82008E0001-EOU-IV SI82008E0002-EOU-IV SI82008E0003-EOU-IV SI82008E0004-EOU-IV SI82008E0005-EOU-IV

Israel Raja @ Rajah @ Raja @

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

12.05.2008 : 15.11.2011 : 13.07.2012

in such passports were found to be untrue.

A7 Varinder Singh was found in possession of one official

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

also obtained official passport

for one Smt. Harleen

Since all the previous cases registered at I. G. I. Airport

A1 filled up application forms in respect of 51 army

passports were made available to him and taking undue

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

PW5 Sher Singh. Other army officials.

(i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v) (vi) (vii) (ix)

(viii) PW34 Girish Kumar U.

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

A3 David Abraham Johnson has also claimed that he has

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

anyone. 6.2 According to him A1 was only a musician in Rajasthan

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

Sl. Name of accused No.

Passport no Exihibit No.

0117317 Ex PW2/C 1 (D140)

Jasvir 47(5) Jagtar 50(8) 48(6)

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

Out of said five accused persons, it will be appropriate to

There does not seem to be any dispute that for the

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

7.6 main list

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

signed application forms. I have seen the application forms as well as

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

Specimen hand writing

and signatures of all four

hand Q437, Q397,

Q74A, Q77, Q399 Q443,

All said specimen hand writing sheets are part of

It seems to me that they all merely wanted to go abroad

of officials who were posted at IGI Airport that day.

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

PW6 Sh. Pawan Kumar was posted as Counter Supervisor

IGI Airport and according to him,

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

prosecution wanted to show by placing on record such boarding

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011

CBI Vs M. Suresh Babu etc 46/2011