A failure to frame a charge or an error or irregularity in the charge will not invalidate a finding, sentence, or order unless it has resulted in a failure of justice.

Indrajit Chatterjee, J.

1. This is an application under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (hereinafter called as the said Code) wherein this petitioner has prayed for an order to set aside the order no. 60 dated May 15, 2014 passed by the learned Judge, 3rd Special Court (C.B.I.) designated Calcutta in Special (C.B.I.) Case No. 13 of 2006.

2. The fact relevant for the purpose of adjudication of this revisional application can be stated in brief thus:

That one R.C. Case No. 5 of 2003 (A) under Sections 120B, 420 read with Sections 511, 477A and Section 13(2) read with Section 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act (hereinafter called as the said Act of 1988) was registered against this petitioner and three others including one company in which this petitioner is the Director. It was alleged in the F.I.R. that public servant Sadanand Kaushik (Accused no.1) when he was posted and functioning as Development Officer of United India Insurance Company Ltd., Div.-V entered into a criminal conspiracy with others and in furtherance of the said conspiracy and in willful misuse of his official position, the said accused no. 1 allegedly accepted ante-dated cheque of Rs. 5,11,875/- towards premium of fire policy covering loss by fire and allied perils including earthquake and made false entries in the scroll by falsifying the accounts to facilitate M/s. Antai Balaji Ltd. to make claim and thereby attempted to cheat and to cause wrongful loss to the United India Insurance Company Ltd., Div.-VI.

3. The matter was investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation (hereinafter called as the C.B.I.) and charge sheet was submitted against four accused persons including the company of that public servant. The case was registered with the trial court being the Special Court No. III (C.B.I), Calcutta.

4. It is the argument of Mr. Jha, learned Advocate, appearing on behalf of the petitioner being the accused no. 3 that actually no written charge was framed against this accused person even though the order dated 31st May, 2010 will reflect that the charge was framed and read over and explained to the accused person. Learned Advocate took me to the copy of that order and also prayed before this court to consider the fact by taking me to the order dated 23rd May, 2013 that on that date, learned Special Court got the report as to the death of the accused no. 1, the public servant involved. He also took me to the impugned order dated 15-05-2014 wherein learned court relied on the order dated 31-05-2010 that the charge was explained to the accused and admitted that no written charge could be found. This is the main portion of the argument of Mr. Jha, learned Advocate, appearing on behalf of the petitioner. He contends by taking me to Section 228 of the Code that the written charge is a must in view of Sub-Section (2) of that Section. He also relied upon the Constitution Bench decision of the Apex Court as reported in AIR 1956 SC 116 (Willie (William) Slaney Vs. State of M.P.) wherein the Apex Court in paragraph no. 85 held “The Code requires that there should a charge and it should be in writing. A deliberate breach of this basic requirement cannot be cured by the assertion that everything was orally explained to the accused and the assessors of jurors, and there was no possible or probable prejudice.”

5. He also referred to another judgment of the Apex Court as reported in (2014) 11 SC 724 (State through Central Bureau of Investigation, New Delhi Vs. Jitendra Kumar Singh) wherein on the fact before the floor of the Apex Court, it was held when the charge could not be framed against the public servant because of his death, the co-accused person cannot be tried by the Special Judge by invoking his jurisdiction under Section 4(3) of the Act of 1988. He also took me to the written charge framed on 15th May, 2014 to say that this written charge was framed when the accused no. 1 was not there in the world and that unfortunately learned t