Anticipatory bail requires proof of exceptional circumstances; mere violation of departmental norms does not suffice to overturn strong evidence of corruption and misappropriation.

ORDER :

A. BADHARUDEEN, J.

This Bail Application has been filed by the 2^nd accused in Crime No.VC/06/2025SIU-1 of 2025 of VACB, Thiruvananthapuram, seeking pre-arrest bail.

2. Heard the learned counsel for the petitioner and the learned Special Public Prosecutor representing the VACB.

3. Perused the records placed by the learned counsel for the petitioner and the records placed by the learned public prosecutor.

4. The prosecution case as per the FIR runs as under;

The 1^st and 2^nd accused while working as Industries Extension Officers (IEO) in the Industries Department who were responsible for implementing development schemes and are entrusted with the authority to grant loan subsidies to women under the BPL category (General) and the implementing officers of the project No. SO, 760/22 of Thiruvananthapuram Corporation, entered into a criminal conspiracy among themselves and others for implementing the self employment beneficiary group scheme and with the intention to cheat and cause wrongful loss to the government, fraudulently prepared forged documents and misappropriated funds by creating false records, manipulated the list of eligible beneficiaries for the subsidy under the scheme, and created fake bills and other documents, disbursed subsidies to these fake beneficiaries, who were not entitled to receive any benefits, during the financial year 2021-2022. They were alleged to have misappropriated a total amount of Rs 1.14 Crores during the period of 1^st accused from September 2021 to March 2022 and during the period of the 2^nd accused from March 2021 to September 2021. Loans were granted to ineligible women who were not enlisted in the beneficiaries list approved by the Corporation Council and without verifying the authenticity of the documents submitted by them, violating the procedures and the guidelines of the scheme, by abusing their official position, dishonestly and fraudulently committed criminal misappropriation, breach of trust and by forging the documents, used such documents as genuine and granted subsidy to those illegal beneficiaries. Subsequently, the officials caused disappearance of documents by willfully misplacing the original records from the said file which caused the issuance of the loan subsidy and thereby government had sustained a wrongful loss of Rs 1.14 Crore and corresponding gain to accused and thus thereby the accused are alleged to have committed the offences punishable U/s 13 (2) r/w 13 (1) (a) of PC (Amendment) Act 2018 and 409, 420, 468, 471, 120(B) & 34 IPC.

5. The learned counsel for the petitioner urged the following grounds while seeking anticipatory bail to the petitioner.

“A. It is pertinent to note that Annexure A2 is the treasury bill book, and if the petitioner authorises any loans during the alleged relevant period, there will be an entry by his name. No transactions were made by the petitioner during the alleged period of time. As there were no funds, the scheme was not implemented during the relevant period.

B. Another allegation against the petitioner that he implemented the scheme and authorised beneficiaries who are not approved by the corporation counsel is false. Anx. A3 is the list of beneficiaries, and the petitioner only implemented the scheme as per the list.

C. There is no iota of evidence stated in Annexure A5 remand report against the petitioner.

D. The petitioner is totally innocent of the offences alleged against him, and the same could be proved at the time of trial.

E. It is submitted that the FIR was registered on 14.05.2025 and the Investigating Officer had sufficient time to investigate the same, and there also does not arise any scope for custodial interrogation of the petitioner or to affe