MOHANDAS LALWANI v. THE STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH
Citation: [1974] 1 S.C.R. 636; 1973 INSC 166
Court: Supreme Court of India
Bench: HANS RAJ KHANNA , A. ALAGIRISWAMI
Judgment date:
Case summary
1973 INSC 166. Supreme Court of India judgment dated 1973-09-11. MOHANDAS LALWANI v. THE STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH. Read the judgment and case details on...
Judgment text
4140 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ( 1974 J 1 s. c. 1t. MOHANDAS LALWANI v. TiiE STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH September ll, J973 [H. R. KHANNA AND A. ALAGmISWAMI, JJ. ) Indian Penal Code, s. 165-Appel/afll attempted to bribe the Chiei Engi· neer to aecure a contract-Trial Court acquitted but High Court convicted and sent,nced the appellant- Whether High C? urt has power of review the entire t•vidtnce under s. 417, Cr. P. C. The accused-appeliant was acquitted by the Special Judge, Bhopal, but con· victed by the High Court under s. 165·A I. P. C. , and sentenced to one year's rigorous in1pri~onment. The pro~ecution case is that on 1\pril 9, 1966, the Chief Engineer (Construction) of ff. eavy Electricals Ltd. \Vas present in hi! office. The a12pellant-accused went there for an interview with two others. It is allef mentioned in report Pl and is also admitte~ 1? Y the accused in his statement under section 342 of the Code of Cnnunal Procedure that Shrivastava took out Rs.
3,000 from the trousers' pocket of the accused under the diI ections of Wadhwa. There is nothing to show that the accused protested against the taking out of the currency notes from his pocket by Shrivastava under the directions of Wadhwa. If the accused was an innocent person and had no guilty conscience, he would in the normal course have flared up and not meekly submitted b the recovery of currency notes from his pocket by Shrivastava under the directions of Wadhwa. The conduct of Wadhwa in directing Shrivastava to take out the envelope containing currency notes from the pocket of the accused is in consonance with the prosecution case . and belies the defence version. The evidence of Gupta and Tiwari PWs regarding the extra judicial confession made by the accused after the arrival of these witnesses lends further corroboration to the evidence of Wadhwa.
These two witness, who were senior officers of HEL, had no enmity with the accused and nothing has been brought out as to why they should make false statements against the accused. It is true that Wadhwa made no mention of the extra judicial confession of the accused in the report sent by him to the police. This omission might also have been due to the fact that Wadhwa did not give full details in the report dictated by him. Be that as it may, even if the evidence regarding the extra judicial confession of the accused were excluded from consideration, the other material on record, particularly the testimony and conduct of Wadhwa as well as the evidence of Shrivastava, furnishes ample ground for basing the conviction of the accused. We are not impressed by the plea taken on behalf of the ac:used that Rs. 3,000, which were recovered from his pocket, had been brought by him for the purpose of depositing security.
The question of the depositing of the security would have arisen only if and when the tender would have been accepted. The amount of security in that event would have to be deposited within 15 days of the date directing the contractor to do so. Argument has also been advanced on behalf of the accused appel· · ! ant that it was not a Condition of the tender that the contractor would use 24 tons of steel in the making of the tanks in question. This mav be so; but it would not make any material difference so far as the present case is concerned. The evidence of Wadhwa ·PW shows that he had learnt from the Assistant Chief Engineer that as against the accused who had stipulated to use 18 tons of steel, the other contractors had stipulated to use 24 tons of steel. The accused in the circwn-stances, might have beoome apprehensive that his tender in spite of MOHANDAS v. M. P. STATE (Khanna, J. ) 643 his lowest quotation might not be accepted.
Necessity might conse· quently have been felt by the acmised to offer illegal gratification with a view to secure a favourable decision in the matter of the accep-tffilce of the tender. The view taken by the trial court in rejecting the evidence . of Wadhwa, in our opinion, was clearly unreasonable and the High 8 Court, in our opinion, had cogent grounds to interfere with the judgment of acquittal of the trial court. We are unable to find any infir uty in the appraisement of the evidence by the High Court as may induce us to take a different view. Reference on behalf of the appellant has been made to the decision of this Court in the case of Kanu Ambu Vish v.
State of Maharashtra(') wherein it was observed that the High Court in reversing a judgment of acquittal should not only consider all matters on record, including the reasons given by the trial court in respect of the order of acquittal, but should particularly consider those aspects which are in favour of the accused, and ought not also act on conjectures or surmises. The above dictum, in our opinion, cannot be of much avail to the appellant because we find that the High Court in reversing the order of acquittal consdiered the matters on record, including the reasons given by the trial court, as well as those aspects which could possibly be claimed by the accused to be favourable to him. It is well settled that the High Court in appeal under section 417 of the Code of Criminal Procedure has full power to review at large the evidence on which the order of acquittal was founded and to reach the oonclusion that upon the evidence the order of acquittal should be reversed.
No limitation should be placed upon that power unless it be found expressly stated in the Code, but in exercising the ,power conferred by the Code and before reaching its conclusion upon fact the High Court should give proper weight and consideration to such matters as (1) the views of the trial judge as to the credibility of the witnesses; (2) the presumption of innocence in favour of the accused, a presumption certainly not weakened by the fact that he has been acquitted at his trial; ( 3) the right of the accused to the benefit of any doubt; and ( 4) the slowness of an appellate court in distnrbing a finding of fact arrived by a judge who had the advantage of seeing the witnesses. We have been taken through the judgments of the trial dourt and the High Court and we find that the judgment of the High Court is not vitiated by any such infirmity as may call for interference by this Court.
Before we part with this case, we would like to observe that as long as an impression exists that corruption is prevalent and that unless one pays to somebody things are not done, there would be always persons who would feel the urge to offer bribe. Bribe would be offered not only to get an undue favour but also to avoid unnecessary harass-ment and to see that no obstruction or delay is caused in getting the most legitimate work done. To prevent the repetition of crimes like (:) A. I. R. 1971 S. C. 2256. the one of which the appellant has been found guilty, it is necessary A to inculcate a general feeling that things are done in due course un-infiuenced by extraneous considerations. It would 'be unfortunate that, rightly or wrongly, an impression were to exist that without payment of illegal gratification, things would not be done. At the same time, the position in law is that if' one makes an offer of bribe to a public servant.
he would be guilty of the offence under section 165A Indian Penal Code. The courts are concerned only with the fact whether the B person arraigned as an accused before them ll. guilty of the offence with which he is charged. The finding regarding the guilt of the accused cannot be affected by any consideration of the social and administra· tive milieu in which the offence is committed. Once the guilt is proved, as it has been in the oase of the appellant, the law must take its course. The appeal fails and is dismissed. s. c. Appeal dismissed.
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