The Madras High Court Bench here has quashed a criminal case booked by Dindigul Civil Supplies Criminal Investigation Department (CS-CID) against three for having allegedly smuggled rice meant for Public Distribution System in 2008.
Allowing a petition filed by the trio, Justice M.M. Sundresh said that the investigating agency had failed to collect credible evidence but arrested the petitioners solely on the basis of a confession statement given by the driver of a lorry used to transport the rice.
He pointed out that the first two petitioners, Durai alias Duraiarasan and Shankar, had been arrested on charges of having purchased the PDS rice from certain individuals and smuggling it using a lorry owned by the third petitioner, Balasingh Christober.
“Except the confession statement, there is no other material. Even the said statement is not sufficient to implicate the petitioners into this crime. There is absolutely no investigation done and no materials placed to come to the conclusion that the petitioners have purchased PDS rice,” the judge said.
He went on to state: “Merely because the lorry driver did not produce the relevant documents, criminal liability cannot be fastened on the petitioners based on the confession statement. In any case, he is not an eye-witness to the alleged procurement by the petitioners.”
Holding that it would be a travesty of justice to allow continuation of prosecution launched against the petitioners, the judge quashed the criminal proceedings pending before a Judicial Magistrate Court in Dindigul since 2009.
