Pune: Sitting Judge Faces Arrest In Corruption Case As Anticipatory Bail Application Rejected

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Pune, 23 February 2021: The District and Sessions Court, Pune, today rejected the anticipatory bail application of a sitting joint civil judge junior division/judicial magistrate first class (JMFC) of the Vadgaon Maval court in a corruption case registered by Dehuroad police station under Pimpri Chinchwad police. 

Additional Sessions Judge SR Navandar rejected the pre-arrest bail plea of JMFC Archana Deepak Jatkar after a detailed hearing as given below: 

Brief facts of the case:­ Complainant Swapnil Madhukar Shevkar, a resident of Induri in Maval taluka of Pune district, is running a milk dairy in the name ‘Kadjai Mata Dudh Sankalan’. He used to supply milk to Amul Dairy of Khed, Pune district. Accused no.1, Shubhavari Gaikwad, approached the complainant on 4/1/2021 and 5/1/2021, falsely pretending herself to be ‘Mhatre Madam’ and told him that there is a criminal case filed against him in the Court of applicant Judicial Officer. 

Accused No.1 also shown him a copy of the criminal complaint and pointed out that it was posted for hearing on 6/1/2021. She gave assurance to get dismissed the criminal case by managing the Presiding Officer i.e. applicant, by making payment of Rs 5,00,000­. When the complainant showed displeasure, she reduced the amount of the bribe to Rs 3,00,000­. 

The complainant, therefore, approached the office of the Anti­corruption Bureau (ACB) on 6/1/2021 and filed a complaint of demand of bribe. The complaint was verified by the investigating officer in presence of two panch witnesses on 8/1/2021, 9/1/2021 and 11/1/2021. During verification, accused No.1 also contacted the applicant and finally demand of Rs 3,00,000­ was made. Verification panchanamas were prepared. On 13/1/2021 trap was laid on accused No.1 in presence of panch witnesses. In the said trap, accused No.1 accepted bribe amount, which was consisting of real cash of Rs 50,000 and duplicate notes of Rs 2,50,000­. Immediately, the accused No.1 was taken into custody. When the hands of the accused No.1 were checked under the ultraviolet lamp, those were found shining with the anthracene powder. 

Accordingly, trap panchanama was prepared. Thereafter, FIR was registered and the accused was formally arrested and interrogated in police custody. The name of the applicant (Jatkar) came to be added as an accused to the crime. Apprehending arrest, the applicant has approached the Court seeking anticipatory bail. 

Arguments of applicant:­ Advocate AL Dongare has argued that there are no direct allegations against the applicant in FIR, that there is no evidence of her involvement either in demand or in acceptance of the amount and the applicant has been falsely implicated in the case.  

“The applicant came in contact with accused No.1 a few days before when she was in search of a caretaker for her child. The applicant contacted the accused No.1 only for the purpose of securing the maidservant and not with any other purpose. It is possible that the accused No.1 had taken undue advantage of the acquaintance of the applicant and demanded bribe in her name. The amount of bribe paid to accused No.1 has been seized, she has been interrogated and now released on bail, nothing is remained to be seized from the accused and therefore her custodial interrogation is not necessary”, the defence lawyer argued.

Arguments of prosecutor:­ APP PS Agarwal argued that there is sufficient evidence to show that the applicant is involved in the commission of the crime. He produced scripts of conversations recorded during verification of bribe and during the trap. According to him, custodial interrogation of the applicant is necessary. The offence is very serious and therefore anticipatory bail may not be granted. 

Reasons for rejection bail:­ Additional Sessions Judge Navandar stated, “I have carefully gone through the papers of investigation. In the complaint dated 6/1/2021, the complainant has specifically mentioned that the accused No.1 contacted him, shown the papers of the criminal case which was filed against him in the Court of the applicant and made an offer to get the said case closed by managing the Judicial Officer i.e. applicant, against payment of a bribe. It is specifically mentioned that initially, the demand was Rs 5,00,000­ and then it was reduced to Rs 3,00,000­. The complaint was verified by ACB in presence of panchas on 8/1/2021, 9/1/2021 and on 11/1/2021. On all the above three occasions, the complainant met accused No.1 in presence of panch witness. 

The conversation between the complainant and accused No.1 has been recorded in the voice recorder. The scripts of conversations are available for scrutiny with the police papers. The conversation dated 8/1/2021 between the complainant and accused No.1 was lasted for a very long time, for more than an hour. During this conversation, the accused No.1 frequently referred to the name of the applicant and gave details of the hearing that took place in the matter on the given dates, in the Court of the applicant.

On 9/1/2021 when the complainant met the accused No.1 she played an audio recording of a call between herself and the applicant. Not only that, the accused No.1 appears to have called up another judicial officer, namely Deshmukh who is also posted at Vadgaon­Maval, complainant had a talk with him and got assured about the prospective order in favour of the complainant. What is more important is that in the same meeting the accused No.1 made a phone call to the applicant and had a talk in respect of the case of the complainant. 

From the conversation, what appears is that the applicant gave an assurance that she would pass orders in favour of the complainant. The conversation is quite a detail, leaving no room for doubt about the involvement of the applicant. The CDRs of mobile numbers of the applicant and accused No.1 have been collected and those are available for scrutiny. During the meeting dated 9/1/2021 and immediately after all the meetings there were an exchange of phone calls between the applicant and accused No.1.  

More precisely, during the meeting of the complainant and accused No.1 dated 9/1/2021, there are phone calls made by the accused No.1 to the applicant and there was a conversation between them. During the meeting dated 11/1/2021 also, the accused No.1 made a phone call to the applicant in the presence of the complainant and there was a detail conversation in respect of the case of the complainant coupled with the assurance of passing of the order in favour of the complainant.  

On that day, in the same meeting, the accused No.1 had also made a phone call to Judicial Officer Deshmukh in the same meeting and got assurance of favourable orders for the complainant. When the CDRs of accused No.1 and the applicant are compared, those match with the timings of meetings mentioned in the verification panchanamas. 

The certified copy of the complaint which was filed against the complainant in the present case is filed by the applicant alongwith the application. The dates are given in the said proceeding match with the dates discussed in the meetings of the complainant and accused No.1, and also with the conversation between accused No.1 and the applicant. 

The applicant does not dispute the frequency of phone calls between herself and the accused No.1. It is her explanation that she came in contact with the accused No.1 being a local person and was seeking her help to engage a caretaker for her child. According to her, she used to chat with the accused No.1 on domestic and allied subjects. 

The explanation given as above, prima facie, does not appear plausible or probable. No Judicial Officer can be believed to have such a casual talk either just before the court hours or during the court hours. There are phone calls in the morning, afternoon and also till late evening. The phone calls were soon before and just after the meetings of the complainant and accused No.1. The purpose of such phone calls can hardly be believed to be as claimed by the applicant. 

The above observations prima facie denote serious involvement of the applicant in the commission of crime i.e. demand and acceptance of bribe through the accused No.1. There are statements of some litigants to whom the accused No.1 approached in a similar manner, in relation to the cases pending in the court of the applicant. In a similar manner, she gave proposals. There appears a serious conspiracy that needs to be excavated. The hidden network needs to be traced out and this cannot be done unless the applicant is interrogated in police custody. It is, therefore, the arguments advanced on behalf of the applicant cannot be accepted. 

The applicant is a public servant. She owes a duty to render services without fear and favour of anybody, particularly when she is working as a Judicial Officer. When it is prima facie noticed that she is involved in corrupt practices, no relief of anticipatory bail can be granted to her.”