The discretion to amalgamate cases under Section 223 of the Criminal Procedure Code is not obligatory and depends on the interest of justice, and the facts, allegations, and evidence must be common for holding a joint trial.

JUDGMENT :

Heard Mr. Rohit Ranjan Sinha, the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner and Mr. Anil Kumar, the learned A.S.G.I. appearing on behalf of the respondent C.B.I.

2. This petition has been filed for quashing of the F.I.R in R.C. 06(A)/2018 registered under section 120B IPC read with sections 7, 12, 13(2), 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 including the charge sheet No.10/2020 dated 18.12.2020, pending in the court of learned A.J.C.-XVI- cum- Special Judge, C.B.I., Ranchi. The prayer is further made that Charge Sheet No.10 of 2020 dated 18.12.2020 in R.C. 06(A)/ 2018 may be directed to be treated as supplementary charge sheet in R.C.03(A)/2017–D dated 10.07.2017.

3. Mr. Rohit Ranjan Sinha, the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner submits that the transaction of both the cases are similar and in view of that, the cases may be tagged together. He submits that in internal page no.12 of the writ petition, he has bifurcated the allegation of different cases. He draws the attention of the Court to page no.138 which is the FIR with regard to R.C.04(A)/2018 and submits that the nature of the allegation in both the R.Cs. are the same. He further submits that in the present case, the charge sheet has been submitted and in paragraph no.16.6 and 16.7, the allegation against the petitioner is made only in close connection with Tapas Kumar Dutta and Vishwanath Agarwal. He further submits that in the charge sheet it has been stated by the C.B.I. that the allegation of R.C.-06(A)/2018 is the of-suit of R.C.- 03(A)/2017 and he further refers to paragraph no.16.19 of the charge sheet and submits that larger conspiracy has been stated therein and in view of that, it is crystal clear that the transactions are the same. He further refers to the rejoinder filed by the petitioner and submits that before the learned court, the C.B.I. has admitted that the transaction involved in the conspiracy may be same, however, the case was registered and the different officers were entrusted with the investigation as there was huge number of the companies to be investigated. He submits that in these documents on the record suggest that for the similar transaction the cases has been registered and in view of that, this Court is competent to direct to amalgamate charge sheet in R.C.-06(A)/2018 with the charge sheet of R.C.-03(A)/2017 and to buttress his argument, he relied in the case of Amitbhai Anichandra Shah v. Central Bureau of Investigation, 2013 0 Supreme (SC) 333.

4. On the other hand, Mr. Anil Kumar, the learned A.S.G.I appearing on behalf of the respondent C.B.I submits that larger conspiracy aspect of the nature is required to be considered by this Court in view of the materials brought on record. He submits that the main case being R.C 03/2017 has been registered and further charge sheet has been submitted under section 7, 12, 13(2), 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act and the said charge sheet was filed on the allegation that Tapas Kumar Dutta was functioning as Principal Commissioner of Income Tax, Ranchi during the year 2016-17 has entered into a criminal conspiracy with several Income Tax Officers and private persons who get the income tax assessment files of the different assessee companies transferred from Kolkata to Hazaribagh for providing undue favour to those persons who have been charged with heavy tax liability in lieu of alleged bribe. He submits that main allegation against the petitioner namely Akash Agarwal is that he was controller of M/s One Time Developers Consultants Pvt. Ltd. and M/s Zoom Infra Builtech Pvt. Ltd. and the said companies got the assessment order dated 15.05.2017 and 27.04.2017 passed by Tarun Roy, Income Tax Officer and those companies got benefitted because of re-assessment of tax liability and petitioner Akash Agarwal was also charge sheeted as accused No.A-9 in that case. He further submits that in R.C. 6/A of 2018, the petitioner was not named in the F.I