Acquittal Under Prevention Of Corruption Act Should Not Be Based Solely On Invalid Sanction: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court (on January 18) opined that acquittal under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 (PC Act) cannot be based solely on invalid Sanction.

“The Sessions Court could not have acquitted the accused only on the ground of alleged invalid sanction, without recording its findings on all the issues involved.,” the Court said. 

The Bench of Justices Bela M Trivedi and KV Vishwanathan were hearing a criminal appeal against the conviction of an accused person under the Indian Penal Code and the PC Act.

In a nutshell, the accused was the manager of Syndicate Bank. The allegation against him was that he abused his office by fraudulently forging the loan application as well as an application for opening a Savings Bank A/c in the name of the fictitious person. Accordingly, the PC Act was invoked against the appellant, a public servant as defined under Section 2(c) of the Act.

The Trial Court acquitted the appellant solely on the ground that the sanction obtained by the prosecution was not valid. Challenging this, CBI approached the Kerala High Court. In its impugned order, the Court held the accused guilty and convicted him. Thus, the present appeal.

At the outset, the Court said that the Trial Court had erred in not recording specific findings merits and instead based the acquittal on the issue of sanction.

“…we are of the considered opinion that since the Special Court has failed to record any specific findings on the Point Nos.2 to 4 on merits and acquitted the appellant only on the ground that the sanction obtained by the prosecution was not valid, the Special Court has committed an error.”

The Top Court was also not convinced by the impugned judgment, since the High Court entered findings on merits on the issues, which the Trial Court had no occassion to conisder at the first instance.

“The High Court convicted the appellant- accused on merits without having the findings of the Sessions Court on record on the point nos. 2 to 4.”

In view of this, the Court had set aside the judgments of the below Courts while remanding the matter to the Trial Court. The Court directed that the case be decided expeditiously and preferably within two months.

Case Title: P.I. BABU vs. C.B.I., Diary No.- 22106 - 2011

Citation : 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 56

Click here to read the order