IN THE HIGH COURT OF SINDH, CIRCUIT COURT LARKANA

Crl.Acquittal Appeal No.S-125 of 2022

Appellant/Complainant	:	Jai Ram s/o Noun Mal Hindu Through Mr.Asif Hussain M.Nawaz Chandio, Advocate.


Date of hearing	:	12.01.2023
Date of decision	:	12.01.2023

JUDGMENT

ZULFIQAR ALI SANGI, J ;- Through instant Criminal Acquittal Appeal, the appellant has impugned the judgment dated 12.11.2022, passed by learned Judicial Magistrate-I/MTMC, Jacobabad in Crl.Case No.86 of 2022 (Re.St.Vs.Bhajjan Lal @ Aneel Kumar), emanating from FIR bearing Crime No.25 of 2022 for offence punishable U/S.489-F PPC, registered with Police Station, A-Section Thull, whereby respondent/accused Bhajjan Lal @ Aneel Kumar was acquitted by extending him benefit of doubt.

2. Precisely, the facts leading to disposal of instant criminal acquittal appeal are that on 17.02.2022 at about 1900 hours, appellant/complainant Jai Ram got registered the FIR with P.S, A-Section Thull, to the effect that respondent/accused Bhajjan Lal @ Aneel Kumar dishonestly issued a cheque amounting to Rs.3,44,560/- in favour of the complainant against purchase of Rice from him and the same on being presented before the concerned bank was dishonoured due to insufficient funds and when the appellant/complainant approached him for return of his money, the respondent/accused refused, for that the present case was registered.

3. On completion of usual investigation, the police submitted final challan against the respondent/accused before learned trial Court where after all legal codal formalities, the charge was framed against him, to which he pleaded not guilty and claimed trial vide his plea was recorded.

4. In order to establish accusation against the respodnent/accused, the prosecution examined in all five witnesses including complainant, mashir, author of FIR, bank official and investigation officer and they all produced certain relevant documents in support of the prosecution case, thereafter, the learned State Counsel closed its side vide statement kept on record.

5. The respondent/accused in his statement recorded in terms of Section 342 Cr.PC denied the allegations leveled against him by pleading his innocence. He however, did not examine himself on oath nor led any evidence in his defence.

6. The learned trial Court after hearing the Counsel for the parties and evaluation of the evidence acquitted the respondent/accused which the appellant/complainant has assailed before this Court by preferring the instant criminal acquittal appeal.

7. Per learned counsel for the appellant/complainant that learned trial Court has passed the judgment in violation of law and there was sufficient material on record to convict the respondent/accused but learned trial Court acquitted him on flimsy grounds; that signatures on the cheques have not been denied by the respondent/accused; that the complainant and his witnesses fully supported the case and the evidence of complainant was corroborated by the evidence of bank official; that no major contradiction is available in the evidence of prosecution witness; that the judgment passed by the learned trial Court is not based on cogent reasons. Lastly, he prayed for admitting the instant criminal acquittal appeal and issuance of notice.

8. Heard learned counsel for appellant and perused the material made available on the record.

9. Perusal of judgment reveals that the learned trial Court has mainly acquitted the respondent/accused on the following reasons;

“In the light of above admission made by complainant neither produced any agreement/receipts/bill with regards the rice trading with accused nor produced even a single title document of his rice trading mill. Further, complainant admitted in his cross examination that, “it is correct to suggest that I have lodged another FIR against the present accused which is also pending before this Court. In this regards, no any such documentary evidence is produced before this Court”. In cross examination, complainant failed to clarify that whether he deposited the said cheque in his own account or another one. Such conduct of complainant creates serious doubt in the prosecution story and unreliable in the eyes of law. Since, as per the contentions, complainant had not placed on record even a single documentary evidence before this Court. The perusal of the statement of complainant and statement given in FIR is totally contradictory and the chief examination of complainant does not given sufficient detail of the incident. But while he examining before the Court he did not give any sufficient explanation about the sell and purchase of rice as given in FIR. He just given the statement that he received the cheque and produce same before the manager of concern bank for encashment whereby complainant was informed about the insufficiency of balance and then same dishonor, return him with memo of insufficiency of balance. The above statement of complainant does not create any liability upon the accused as the mere issuance of cheque is not sufficient to maintain the liability Section 489-F PPC. In this regard I relied upon the case law reported in case law 2021 PCr.LJ-669”.

10. It is well settled by now that the scope of appeal against acquittal is very narrow and there is a double presumption of innocence and that the Courts generally do not interfere with the same unless they find the reasoning in the impugned judgment to be perverse, arbitrary, foolish, artificial, speculative and ridiculous as was held by the Supreme Court in the cases of State Versus Abdul Khaliq and others (PLD 2011 SC 554), wherein the Hon’ble Supreme Court has held as under:-

From the ratio of all the above pronouncements and those cited by the learned counsel for the parties, it can be deduced that the scope of interference in appeal against acquittal is most narrow and limited because in an acquittal the presumption of innocence is significantly added to the cardinal rule of criminal jurisprudence, that an accused shall be presumed to be innocent until proved guilty; in other words, the presumption of innocence is doubled. The courts shall be very slow in interfering with such an acquittal judgment, unless it is shown to be perverse, passed in gross violation of law, suffering from the errors of grave misreading or non-reading of the evidence; such judgments should not be lightly interfered and heavy burden lies on the prosecution to rebut the presumption of innocence which the accused has earned and attained on account of his acquittal. It has been categorically held in a plethora of judgments that interference in a judgment of acquittal is rare and the prosecution must show that there are glaring errors of law and fact committed by the Court in arriving at the decision, which would result into grave miscarriage of justice; the acquittal judgment is perfunctory or wholly artificial or a shocking conclusion has been drawn. Moreover, in number of dictums of this Court, it has been categorically laid down that such judgment should not be interjected until the findings are perverse, arbitrary, foolish, artificial, speculative and ridiculous (Emphasis supplied). The Court of appeal should not interfere simply for the reason that on the re-appraisal of the evidence a different conclusion could possibly be arrived at, the factual conclusions should not be upset, except when palpably perverse, suffering from serious and material factual infirmities. It is averred in The State v. Muhammad Sharif (1995 SCMR 635) and Muhammad Ijaz Ahmad v. Raja FahimAfzal and 2 others (1998 SCMR 1281) that the Supreme Court being the final forum would be chary and hesitant to interfere in the findings of the Courts below. It is, therefore, expedient and imperative that the above criteria and the guidelines should be followed in deciding these appeals.

11. Based upon the above discussion, I am of the humble view that the learned trial Court has rightly acquitted the respondent/accused by way of impugned judgment which even otherwise does not suffer from any illegality to be interfered with by this Court by way of instant Criminal Acquittal Appeal, the same fails and is dismissed in limine together with listed application.

JUDGE