THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE K. SURENDER CRIMINAL PETITION No.4263 of 2020

ORDER:

This petition is filed by the petitioner, who was arrayed as Accused no.1, questioning the Remand Order dated 01.09.2020, passed by the Prl.Spl.Judge for SPE & ACB Cases, City Civil Court, Hyderabad in Crime No.03/ACB-WRL/2020.

2. The impugned remand order dated 01.09.2020 reads as follows:

“A.O.1 and A.O.2 are produced before me at 3:30 p.m. through PC.1128, WPC.2441, HG 1257 of ACB , Warangal. Before the production of accused by ACB, M/s.Vankina, Advocate & Partners advocates filed their memo of appearance for AO.1 and informed me through the bench clerk that they will file written arguments and they want to oppose the remand of AO.1. They sent soft copy of written arguments to the official E-Mail. In view of the said objection Special P.P was informed to get ready to submit her arguments. I have heard the learned counsel for AO.1 Sri Midhun Kumar for AO.1 and Smt.Manogna, Special P.P through video call. Sri Midhun Kumar opposed the remand of AO.1 on various grounds. He has submitted that AO.1 who is working as DCTO with good salary and who is due for promotion never demanded any bribe as alleged in the Remand Case Diary. She could obtain an order for her promotion through Tribunal and likely to be promoted in this month, somebody who wanted to see the denial of her promotion must have hatched a plan and created all these allegations. He has also submitted that the verbatim of alleged voice recorded did not disclose that AO.1 demanded bribe that itself show that a false case has been foisted against AO.1. He has also submitted that the ACB authorities did not issue notice under section 41 of Cr.P.C. as required and as directed by Hon’ble Supreme Court before the arrest of AO.1, but served the notice only after her arrest. He has also submitted that the grounds on which IO sought for remand of AO.1 does not exist and this court can direct AO.1 to attend before the court if her presence is required and absolutely there is no necessity to order judicial custody of AO.1. He has also submitted that the ACB officials did not serve all the documents on the basis of which they are asking Judicial Custody of AO.1 and there is no prima facie case to remand AO.1 to judicial custody. The learned Special P.P has submitted that at the stage of remand the court has to see whether there are grounds to remand the Accused and if such grounds exists the court has got power to send AO.1 to Judicial Custody and as could be seen from the entire record including FIR, Mediator Report and Verbatim of conversation between AO.1 and A2 it is quite clear that AO.1 demanded Rs.5,000/- for issuing clearance certificate to the defacto complainant and the same was later reduced to Rs.3,000/- and he requested to pay Rs.2,000/- and that the VCD if played would show the actual conversation between A2 and defacto complainant, thereby there are grounds to remand the Accused Officer to Judicial Custody. The learned counsel for AO.1 has added that the conversation between A2 and defacto complainant may not be a ground for sending AO.1 to jail.

I have paused FIR, RCD, Verbatim dated 26.08.2020 between defacto complainant, AO.1, and A2. As per the complaint lodged by the defacto complainant dt.26.08.2020 it is alleged that when he went to AO.1 for clearance certificate, AO.1 demanded Rs.5,000/- and when he expressed his inability to pay such amount AO.1 asked him to settle the issue through A2, and when he approached A2, A2 informed the defacto complainant that he has to pay the bribe for obtaining certificate. As per the conversation dt.26.08.2020 it shows when he went to AO.1 she directed him to A2 and A2 informed him that he can pay Rs.3,000/-. This is not the stage to go into the merits of the case. I am not supposed to decide at this stage whether really A2 was asked to collect money from the defacto complainant by A.O.1. I am supposed to see whether there are grounds to remand AO.1 and A