Managing DDirector of Daffodils Associates Ltd. v. Officer-in-Charge, Pal tan Bazari Police Station

The petitioner is aggrieved by Annexure -4 letter dated 13.01.2011 by w hich he in the capacity of Managing Ddirector of Daffodils Associates Ltd. was i nformed that transactions in respect of the account No. 30272785777 has been put to hold as per the letter dated 13.12.2011 received from Officer-in-Charge, Pal tan Bazari Police Station in respect of P.S. Case Noi. 644/2010 registered under Section 406/420 IPC read with Section 4/5/6 of Price Chits and Money Circulatio n Banning Act, 1978. As stated in the writ petition, the case was registered as Paltan Bazar P.S. Case No. 644/2010 under the provisions referred to above. The petitioner ha s obtained bail in respect of the said case. According to the petitioner, the im pugned direction to the respondent Bank could not have been issued to keep on ho ld the account in question. In the counter affidavit filed by the respondent No. 5, it has been stated that the aforesaid P.S. Case was registered on the basis of the FIR submitted by one Shri Krishna Deka. The complainant identified himself as agent of Daffodils Asso ciates Ltd. In the complaint, it has been stated that he alongwith other agents, namely Shri Upen Ram Borah, Smti. Jonaki Borah and Shri Manindra Pathak collec ted money from various customers against each policy and deposited the amount at the account of Daffodils Group of Companies. It was alleged in the complaint th at the petitioner and other supervisors did not make payment to the policy holde rs even after maturity of the policy and closed down of Head Office situated at Ulubari, Guwahati. During the investigation, the I.O. examined the complainant and other witnesses from which it transpires that the financial institution was closed by the petiti oner when the policy holder wanted refund of the money after maturity of their policy. The affidavit further states that one Shri Allauddin Ahmed, APS, in the office o f the Director, BI(EO), Assam submitted an FIR before the Officer-in-Charge, BI( EO) and the case was registered as BI(EO) P.S. Case No. 16/2011 under Section 12 0(B)/406/420 IPC read with Section 4/5/6 of the Prize Chits and Money Circulatio n (Banning) Act, 1978. It was alleged that non-banking financial Company cannot accept demand deposits without having prior registration from Reserve Bank of In dia. But the Daffodils Group of Companies accepted demand deposits from public w ith provision of incredible return of the deposits with return of original inves tment at the end of the year or so. The aforesaid case was investigated upon and during investigation, the I.O. subm itted a prayer before the CJM, Kamrup, Guwahati for amalgamation of P.S. Case No . 16/2011 with Paltan Bazar P.S. Case No. 644/2010. The prayer made by the I.O. was allowed by the Court below on 02.07.2011. In paragraph-7 of the counter affidavit, it has been stated that even after obta ining bail by the petitioner he did not appear before the I.O. for recording his statement as required under the provision of Cr.P.C. The I.O. made several atte mpts to examine the petitioner, but he was avoiding the police. It was found th at the petitioner suddenly closed his office and vacated the rented premises wi thout giving any prior information. The land lady and her son stated before the police that the petitioner did not pay house rent for the last three months. As stated in the affidavit, examination of the petitioner is required in the intere st of investigation, but the petitioner did not cooperate with the investigation . It is in the aforesaid circumstances, Paltan Bazar Police wrote the impugned let ter to the Bank pursuant to which the account number has been put on hold. Mr. N. Dhar, learned counsel for the petitioner submits that Officer-in-Charge, Paltan Bazar Police Station does not have any authority to make the account in-o perative. He submits that in case of seizure of the account alongwith the amou nts therein, it will have to be ordered by the learned Court below. On the other hand, Ms. B. Dutta, learned State counsel submits that the bank acc ount has been made in-operative in the interest of investigation. She submits th at if in the meantime the petitioner is allowed to withdraw the amount, same wil l result in financial loss to the customers. In this connection she has referred to the decision of the Apex Court in State of Maharashtra vs. Tapas D. Neogy r eported in (1999) 7 SCC 685 in which under similar circumstances the Apex Court dealing with various decisions of the High Courts including this Court, made the following observations: (cid:28)12. Having considered the divergent views taken by different High Courts with r egard to the power of seizure under Section 102 of the Code of Criminal Procedur e, and whether the bank account can be held to be (cid:28)property (cid:29) within the meaning of the said Section 102(1), we see no justification to give any narrow interpre tation to the provisions of the Criminal procedure Code. It is well known that c orruption in public offices has become so rampant that it has become difficult t o cope up with the same. Then again the time consumed by the courts in concludin g the trials is another factor which should be borne in mind in interpreting the provisions of Section 102 of the Criminal Procedure Code and underlying object engrafted therein, inasmuch as if there can be no order of seizure of the bank a ccount of the accused then the entire money deposited in a bank which is ultimat ely held in the trial to be the outcome of the illegal gratification, could be w ithdrawn by the accused and the courts would be powerless to get the said money which has any direct link with the commission of the offence committed by the ac cused as a public officer. We are, therefore, persuaded to take the view that t he bank account of the accused or any of his relations is (cid:28)property (cid:29) within the meaning of Section 102 of the Criminal Procedure Code and a police officer in co urse of investigation can seize or prohibit the operation of the said account if such assets have direct links with the commission of the offence for which the police officer is investigating into. The contrary view expressed by the Karnata ka, Gauhati and Allahabad High Courts, does not represent the correct law. It ma y also be seen that under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, in the matter of imposition of fine under sub-section(2) of Section 13, the legislatures have provided that the courts in fixing the amount of fine shall take into considerat ion the amount or the value of the property which the accused person has obtaine d by committing the offence or where the conviction is for an offence referred t o in clause (e) of sub-section (1) of Section 13, the pecuniary resources or pro perty for which the accused person is unable to account satisfactorily. The inte rpretation given by us in respect of the power of seizure under Section 102 of t he Criminal procedure Code is in accordance with the intention of the legislatur e engrafted in Section 16 of the Prevention of Corruption Act referred to above. In the aforesaid premises, we have no hesitation to come to the conclusion that the High Court of Bombay committed error in holding that the police officer co uld not have seized the bank account or could not have issued any direction to t he bank officer, prohibiting the account of the accused from being operated upon . Though we have laid down the law, but so far as the present case is concerned, the order impugned has already been given effect to and the accused has been op erating his account, and so, we do not interfere with the same. (cid:29) From the above decision of the Apex Court, it is seen that the Police Of ficer is entitled to take action impugned in this proceeding and no fault can be attributed to him for doing so. On the last occasion when the matter was taken up noticing the aforesaid stand of the respondents in their counter affidavit, learned counsel for the petitioner was asked to make the petitioner available be fore the police for interrogation etc. to which his submission was that appropri ate advice was given to the petitioner to co-operate with the investigation. Lea rned counsel for the petitioner submits that as per his advice, the petitioner h as visited the police station on many occasions. However, learned State counsel submits that as per the affidavit, the petitioner did not co-operate with the i nvestigation. In view of the above, the writ petition is dismissed by not interfering with the action on the part of the police.