K. Ramakrishnan, J.

1. The first accused in C.C.No.36/1999 on the file of the Enquiry Commissioner and Special Judge, Thrissur is the appellant herein. The appellant along with two others were charge sheeted by the Deputy Superintendent of Police, Vigilance and Anti Corruption Bureau, Kottayam unit in VC/8/91 of VACB, Kottayam under section 5(1)(c) and (d) read with section 5(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1947 (hereinafter referred to as 'the P.C.Act' for short) and sections 409 and 120B of the Indian Penal Code.

2. The case of the prosecution in nutshell was that the first accused, the appellant herein, being the Superintendent of the Kerala State Warehousing Corporation, Kottayam and third accused, being the Class-IV employee of the said Corporation, entered into a criminal conspiracy along with the second accused, who was working as Assistant at the Kerala State Warehousing Corporation and dishonestly and fraudulently misappropriated wheat worth Rs.33,538.75 and rice worth Rs.46,754.20 between the period 23.3.1987 and 16.11.1987 and thereby all of them have committed the above said offences.

3. After the investigation, final reports were filed before the court below as 'A' and 'B' charge and on the basis of 'B' charge court below had taken cognizance of the case as C.C.No.36/1999 During the course of the investigation, the original second accused died and charge against him was abated and final reports were filed only against original accused 1 and 3, who includes the present appellant.

4. When the accused appeared before the court below, after hearing both sides, charge under sections 5(1)(c) and (d) read with section 5(2) of the P.C. Act, 1947 and sections 409 and 120 B of the Indian Penal Code was framed and the same was read over and explained to them and they pleaded not guilty. In order to prove the case of the prosecution, Pws 1 to 9 were examined and Exts.P1 to P68 were marked on their side. After closure of the prosecution evidence, the accused were questioned under section 313 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (hereinafter referred to as 'the Code' for short) and they denied all the incriminating circumstances brought against them in the prosecution evidence. The first accused had stated that he had not committed any offence and he was innocent of the same and he has been falsely implicated in the case at the instance of Balachandran, who created some documents against him. He had further stated that he was in charge of 19 godowns in Kottayam district and it is physically impossible for him to monitor personally all the incoming and outgoing articles in each godown. Further, the second accused was in charge of this godown who was responsible for the receipt and release of articles and he was only issuing the stock receipt and release orders on the basis of the slip received from the godown sent by the second accused. He had not committed any misappropriation. There is no dereliction of duty on his side. He came to know about the deficit only during handing over the charge while physical verification was done. Further, the actual loss has not been correctly assessed. Due deduction has not been given for shrinkage and there were mistakes occurred in the weight using the defect in the balance kept in the godown. These aspects were not properly appreciated by the special judge as well. So he had not committed any offence. The original third accused had submitted that he was only a class-IV employee and he was only acting as per the direction of his superiors and he had no control or domain over any of the articles and he is only helping despatch of the articles on the basis of the release order issued. In order to prove the case of the appellant, one of the employees was examined as DW1. After considering the evidence on record, the court below found the third accused not guilty of the offences under sections 5(1)(c) and (d) read with section 5(2) of the P.C.Act, 1949 and sections 120 B and 409 of the In