Procedural compliance under Section 52A of the NDPS Act is essential for the validity of evidence in drug-related cases.

The appellants are accused in Sessions Case No.748/2017 on the file of the 1st Additional Sessions Court, Thrissur. The appellant in Crl.Appeal No.602/2020 is accused No.1. The appellant in Crl.Appeal No.671/2021 is accused No.2. The third accused is the appellant in Crl.Appeal No.722/2020. The appellant in Crl.Appeal No.590/2020 is accused No.4.

2. The appellants have been convicted under Sections 20 (b)II(C) of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act ,

1985. The charge against the appellants/accused is that, on 27.05.2017 at 15.15 hrs, they were found possessing 25.790 kgms of ganja in a car bearing registration No.KL-24E-1406 and 42.730 grams of ganja in a pick up van bearing registration No.KL-09-2430 at Kothakulam beach.

3. The Sub Inspector of Police, Valappad arrested the accused from the place of occurrence along with the contraband substance.

4. The Investigating Officer submitted final report. The appellants/accused appeared in response to the summons. They pleaded not guilty to the charge and therefore they came to be tried by the trial court. The prosecution examined PWs.1 to 22 and proved Ext.P1 to P22 and Mos.1 to 77. Ext.D1 was marked as case diary contradiction. The learned Sessions Judge found the appellants guilty of the offence alleged and passed the impugned judgment of conviction and sentence.

5. I have heard Sri.K.V.Sabu, Sri.P.K.Varghese, Sri.C.K.Vidyasagar and Sri.Mohamed Sabah, the learned counsel appearing for the appellants and Sri.G.Sudheer, the learned Public Prosecutor appearing for the State.

6. The learned counsel for the appellants raised the following grounds to challenge the conviction and sentence:

(a) The prosecution failed to establish the link connecting the accused and the contraband allegedly seized.

(b) The samples of the seized contraband were not drawn in the presence of the jurisdictional Magistrate and the inventory of the seized contraband was not duly certified by the Magistrate.

(c) The act of drawing the sample by the Detecting Officer at the scene of occurrence is against the mandate of Section 52A of the NDPS Act.

7. The Sub Inspector of Police, Valappad [PW1] is the Detecting Officer. On 27.05.2017, PW1 got reliable information that two vehicles were parked at Kothakulam beach with intend to sell ganja. PW1 recorded the information and intimated the same to the Superior Officer and proceeded to the place of occurrence along with four other members of his police team. They reached the place of occurrence at 15.15 hrs. PW1 found a car bearing registration No. KL-24E-1406 and a pick-up van bearing registration No. KL-09-2430 at the beach. PW1 searched the vehicles and the body of the accused in the presence of the Circle Inspector of Police, Kodungalloor [PW4].

PW1 recovered five polythene packets and 10 other bags sticked with brown cellophane tape from the car bearing registration No.KL-24E-

1406. The packets contained ganja consisting leaf, flowers, stem and fruit. The contraband weighed 25.79kgs. PW1 recovered 42.73grams of ganja from the pick up van also. The Detecting Officer collected samples from each of the 15 packets recovered from the car. The remaining ganja taken from the car was taken in polythene covers and marked as Ext.C1 to C15. He also collected sample of ganja recovered from the pick up van at the scene of occurrence. The samples were packed in brown paper, sealed and labelled. The Detecting Officer also collected two samples from the ganja seized from the pick up van.

The remaining ganja was packed in a brown paper, sealed and numbered as C16 to C38. The samples collected from the car were numbered as S1 to S30 and the samples collected from the pick up van were numbered as S31 to S76.

8. The properties, including the samples, were produced before the Court as per Ext.P13 property list. The samples were then forwarded to the Forensic Science Laboratory for analysis. Ext.P20 FSL report was prepared at the laboratory. Ext.P20 revealed that the contraba