WICKUM A. KALUARACHCHI, J.

The accused-appellant was indicted in the High Court of Panadura for trafficking and possession of 2.56 grams of Heroin, on or about 01.02.2014, offences punishable under Section 54A(b) and 54A(d) of the Poisons, Opium and Dangerous Drugs Ordinance as amended by Act No.13 of 1984. After trial, the learned High Court Judge of Panadura convicted the accused-appellant on both counts by his judgment dated 02.05.2019 and imposed life imprisonment for both counts. This appeal has been preferred against the said convictions and the sentences.

Prior to the hearing, written submissions were filed on behalf of both parties. The learned Counsel for the appellant and the learned Additional Solicitor General for the respondent made oral submissions at the hearing of the appeal.

In brief, this is the prosecution story:

On 01^st February 2014, upon receiving information from a reliable informant about heroin is being packed for the purpose of trafficking, PW-1, OIC of the Panadura-North vise squad, organized a team of police officers for a raid and left the police station at 01.35 p.m., using a private van traveling on the road. The driver of the van had dropped Jana Udana the police officers about 25 meters away from “ Gammana ”. Thereafter, they walked to the house where the raid was carried out. As per the information given by the informant, they have identified the wooden house where the heroin was being packed.

Thereafter, PW-1 had asked the other police officers to surround the house while he was observing inside the house through a hole in the wooden boards and had seen a person who was sitting on the bed packing something into cellophane bags. PW-1 asked one of the officers to knock at the door. However, the person who was inside got frightened and said that he is suffering from “tuberculosis.” Thereafter, on the instructions of PW-1, PC Senarath (PW-3) pushed the door open, and both PW-1 and PW-3 went inside the house, examined the packets, and identified the substance in the packets as heroin. The accused- appellant had been arrested with 5 cellophane bags containing 200 heroine packets.

The learned counsel for the appellant based his arguments on three grounds of appeal.

1. The learned trial Judge has failed to realize that the prosecution has not proved its case beyond a reasonable doubt.

2. The learned trial Judge has failed to appreciate the fact that non-identification of the vehicle which was used for the raid and its driver.

3. The learned trial Judge erred in law by failing to consider inter se contradictions between the evidence of prosecution witnesses.

The learned counsel for the appellant contended that all the raids conducted by the police in Sri Lanka use vehicles belonging to the police department, and thus using a van that was traveling on the road for the raid is thoroughly unbelievable. I regret that I am unable to agree with that contention because there are instances where private vehicles are used for raids. In particular, when it is necessary not to reveal that the police officers are going to conduct a raid, private vehicles are used.

Next, I wish to consider the inter se contradiction shown by the learned counsel in respect of the officers who went to the place of the raid. He contended that the main investigating officer, PW-1, stated that four police officers went to the appellant’s house, PW-3 stated that all the police officers went to the appellant’s house but PW-5 took a contradictory position and stated in his evidence that he was inside the van during the raid.

PW-1 stated in his testimony that four police officers, including PW-5, went on the raid and that PC 67091-Chathuranga later joined the team. The van stopped 25 meters away from the house where the raid was carried out. So, it is apparent that PW-5 has also gone to the place of the raid with the other police officers. The only issue is whether he got out of the van and joined the other police officers in conducting the raid. When