1. Both these criminal revisions filed under sections 397 and 401 of Cr.P.C. assail the rejection of an application under section 227 of Cr.P.C. filed by the petitioner for discharging him of the offences punishable under sections 489A, 489B & 489C of IPC, in which common set of facts are involved, after being heard analogously are being decided by this common order.

2. The sole ground of challenge raised by the petitioner is that except for the statement under section 27 of Indian Evidence Act made by the co-accused Jagdish, there is no evidence on record to support the case of the prosecution qua the petitioner even for the purpose of framing of charge in the above said offence.

3. Perusal of the charge sheet filed by the petitioner indicates that a person named Jagdish S/o Bhagwan Lal Khatik was arrested by the police who was in possession of several counterfeit currency notes of denomination of Rs. 500/- for the purpose of circulating the same in the market. In the statement of said Jagdish recorded under section 27 of Indian Evidence Act, the name of the petitioner was disclosed.

4. Counsel for petitioner has placed reliance on a Single Bench decision of this Court in the case of Prakash Singh V. State of M.P. 1994(II) MPWN 72 in support of his contention that naming of a person by co-accused in a statement under section 27 of Indian Evidence Act cannot enable the prosecution to bring that person within the domain of suspicion much less grave suspicion for enabling the court to frame charge of an offence for which no other evidence is collected by the prosecution. In sums and substance the said decision lays down that the statement under section 27 of Indian Evidence Act for disclosure of fact by an accused cannot be used to implicate another person against whom there is no other piece of evidence collected by the prosecution.

5. Analysing the statutory provision, it is seen that section 27 of Indian Evidence Act reads thus:

“27. How much of information received from accused may be proved- Provided that, when any fact is deposed to as discovered in consequence of information received from a person accused of any offence, in the custody of a police officer, so much of such information, whether it amounts to a confession or not, as relates distinctly to the fact thereby discovered, may be proved.”

6. A plain reading of section 27 of Indian Evidence Act indicates that the statement under section 27 of Indian Evidence Act is an exception to the ban imposed upon the courts to utilize the confessional statement made under sections 25 and 27 of Indian Evidence Act, so as to protect a person making disclosure from being falsely implicated by the police in whose custody that person remains at the time of making disclosure. The provision of section 27 of Indian Evidence Act further indicates that the facts disclosed under section 27 of Indian Evidence Act can be used only against the person making disclosure and not against any other person.

7. The present case relates to the stage of framing of charges under section 228 of the Cr.P.C. which for convenience is reproduced below:

“228.Framing of charge - (1) If, after such consideration and hearing as aforesaid, the Judge is of opinion that there is ground for presuming that the accused has committed an offence which -

(a) is not exclusively triable by the Court of Session, he may, frame a charge against the accused and, by order, transfer the case for trial to the Chief Judicial Magistrate, [or any other Judicial Magistrate of the first class and direct the accused to appear before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, or, as the case may be, the Judicial Magistrate of the first class, on such date as he deems fit, and thereupon such Magistrate] shall try the offence in accordance with the procedure for the trial of warrantcases instituted on a police report;

(b) is exclusively triable by the Court, he shall frame in writing a charge against the accused.

(2) Where the Judge frames any charge und