At the charge framing stage, the court assesses whether a prima facie case exists, focusing on the allegations rather than the proof of guilt.

ORDER :

1. Instant revision petition has been filed by the petitioner against the order dated 17.11.2022 passed by learned Special Judge (Prevention of Corruption Act) Cases, Sriganganagar whereby, the trial court framed charges against the petitioner for offences under Section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act and Section 120-B IPC.

2. Brief facts of the case are that an FIR No. 265/2019 came to be registered by P.S. ACB, Jaipur against the petitioner and co- accused Ramswaroop for offence under Sections 7, 8 of Prevention of Corruption Act and Section 120B IPC on the basis of complaint made by complainant Arvind Kumar. It was alleged that the co- accused Ramswaroop had demanded bribe of Rs.20,000/- on behalf of petitioner for passing the tender under Bus Saarthi Yojana. After verification, the ACB laid a trap on 30.08.2019 and during the trap proceedings, the co-accused Ramswaroop was caught red handed. During investigation, the petitioner was also arrested. After investigation, the ACB submitted chargesheet against the petitioner under Section 7 of Prevention of Corruption Act & 120B IPC. Thereafter, arguments upon charge were heard and by way of impugned order dated 17.11.2022, charges were framed by the trial court. Hence, this revision petition.

3. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that on perusal of FIR as well as the challan papers, there is no evidence whatsoever to frame charges against the petitioner for aforesaid offences. It is argued that neither any demand was made by the petitioner nor there is any allegation against the present petitioner. The petitioner was working as Chief Manager of RSRTC and he has been implicated on the basis of statement of co-accused with the aid of Section 120B IPC. It is argued that there is no call-recording of any conversation between the petitioner and the complainant, therefore, there was no question of accepting any illegal gratification. It is argued that no offence whatsoever is made out against the petitioner and the impugned order framing charges is liable to be set aside. Learned counsel placed reliance on the order passed by co-ordinate Bench of this Court in the case of Jitendra Singh Vs. State (S.B. Criminal Revision Petition No. 265/2023) decided on 16.05.2023 and Anil Kumar vs. State (S.B. Criminal Revision Petition No. 509/2018) decided on 09.09.2024.

4. Per contra, learned Public Prosecutor supported the order passed by the learned Trial Court and argued that the police after thorough investigation submitted challan against the petitioner and the trial court after going through the entire record, has framed charges against the petitioner. It is argued that there is allegation against the present petitioner for receiving money from the complainant through co-accused Ramswaroop, which is evident from the transcript, therefore, the order of framing charge passed by the learned Court below does not suffer from any infirmity and all other questions raised in regard to the present case are to be considered by the learned Trial Court at the appropriate stage. The petitioner had earlier filed criminal misc. petition before this Court for quashing of FIR. The said misc petition has already been dismissed vide order dated 17.09.2020 with liberty to raise all the objections at the appropriate stage of trial.

5. I have thoughtfully considered the arguments advanced on behalf of the parties and perused the material available on record.

6. From the perusal of the material on record, more particularly, the transcript of conversation, it is clear that petitioner before whom the work was pending, demanded the bribe money through the co-accused Ramswaroop. The word ‘gratification’ implies nexus between demand and acceptance with some public duty to be performed by the public servant himself or through any other public servant. After perusing the documents and studying the evidence collected during investigation, this Court is of the opinion that trial court has not committed any