ITEM NO.33 COURT NO.9 SECTION II-A S U P R E M E C O U R T O F I N D I A RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS Petition(s) for Special Leave to Appeal (Crl.) No(s). 8840/2023 (Arising out of impugned final judgment and order dated 30-06-2023 in CRWP No. 799/2023 passed by the High Court of Judicature at Bombay at Aurangabad)

VIDYADHAR Petitioner(s)

VERSUS THE CENTRAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION Respondent(s)

(FOR ADMISSION and I.R. and IA No.139838/2023-EXEMPTION FROM FILING C/C OF THE IMPUGNED JUDGMENT and IA No.139839/2023-EXEMPTION FROM FILING O.T. and IA No.139840/2023-PERMISSION TO FILE ADDITIONAL DOCUMENTS/FACTS/ANNEXURES )

Date : 31-07-2023 This petition was called on for hearing today.

CORAM : HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE HRISHIKESH ROY HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE PANKAJ MITHAL For Petitioner(s) Mr. Nishant Ramakantrao Katneshwarkar, AOR Ms. Suvarna Ganu., Adv.

Mr. Sanket Sanjeev Deshpande, Adv.

Ms. Mrinal Pande, Adv.

For Respondent(s)

UPON hearing the counsel the Court made the following

O R D E R

Heard Mr. Nishant Ramakantrao Katneshwarkar, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner.

2. The petitioner who is facing charges under the provisions of Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 requested for a copy of the voice sample of the alleged conversion between the complainant and Signature Not Verified Digitatlly shigneed b y accused and the Court then furnished him a copy of the voice SWETA BALODI Date: 2023.08.03 Reason:

sample and conversions in a pen-drive. However, along with the pen- drive, its hash value certificate and other details of the pen-

drive were not supplied. Accordingly, the petitioner made an application for furnishing the certificate of hash value and other details of the pen-drive but the same was dis-allowed by the learned Sessions Judge and the said order is upheld by the High Court in the impugned judgment.

3. In the above context, Mr. Katneshwarkar, learned counsel refers to the ratio in ‘P. Gopalkrishnan Alias Dileep Vs. State of Kerala & Anr., reported in (2000) 9 SCC 161, where this Court made the following observations:

“……….

38. It is crystal clear that all documents including “electronic record” produced for the inspection of the Court alongwith the police report and which prosecution proposes to use against the accused must be furnished to the accused as per the mandate of Section 207 of the 1973 Code. The concomitant is that the contents of the memory card/pen-drive must be furnished to the accused, which can be done in the form of cloned copy of the memory card/pen-drive. It is cardinal that a person tried for such a serious offence should be furnished with all the material and evidence in advance, on which the prosecution proposes to rely against him during the trial. Any other view would not only impinge upon the statutory mandate contained in the 1973 Code, but also the right of an accused to a fair trial enshrined in Article 21 of the Constitution of India.

44. Needless to mention that the appellant before us or the other accused cannot and are not claiming any expertise, much less, capability of undertaking forensic analysis of the cloned copy of the contents of the memory card/pen-drive. They may have to eventually depend on some expert agency. In our opinion, the accused, who are interested in reassuring themselves about the genuineness and credibility of the contents of the memory card in question or that of the pen-drive produced before the trial Court by the prosecution on which the prosecution would rely during the trial, are free to take opinion of an independent expert agency, such as the CFSL on such matters as they may be advised, which information can be used by them to confront the prosecution witnesses including the forensic report of the State FSL relied upon by the prosecution forming part of the police report.

50. In conclusion, we hold that the contents of the memory card/pen drive being electronic record must be regarded as a document. If the prosecution is relying on the same, ordinarily, the accused must be given a