“Trap Laying Officer, makes efforts to verify the factum of demand of bribe by the public servant before initiating the trap proceedings,” Supreme Court

While hearing the Mir Mustafa Ali Hasmi vs. The State of A.P.  case on July 10, 2024, the Supreme Court (SC) of India acquitted the public servant in the corruption case after noting that the prosecution failed to verify the factum of demand of bribe. The bench said, “We have no hesitation in holding that the prosecution miserably failed to prove the factum of demand of bribe against the appellant(AO1-Forest Section Officer) by reliable direct or circumstantial evidence. The allegation regarding acceptance of bribe by the appellant(AO1) is primarily based on the evidence of the complainant(PW-1-Mukka Ramesh) and PW-2 (Potagunta Ramesh Naidu) and the DySP(PW-10-Shri G. Ramachander, Deputy Superintendent of Police). From the extracted portion of the deposition of the complainant(PW-1)...it is comprehensible that he admitted that the appellant(AO1), forgot his rexine bag in the coffee shop and that the complainant(PW-1) picked up the same and handed it over to the appellant(AO1).” The matter was heard by a two-judge bench consisting of Justice Sandeep Mehta and Justice BR Gavai. 

The SC, in its judgment, said, “It is the settled convention in such cases that the Trap Laying Officer, makes efforts to verify the factum of demand of bribe by the public servant before initiating the trap proceedings. The factum of demand of bribe can also be verified by recording the telephonic conversation between the decoy and the suspect public servant. Often, a recording device is secretly placed on the person of the decoy to record the conversation which would transpire during the course of acceptance of bribe by the public servant.” The bench gave the benefit of doubt to the public servant. Hence, there was no satisfactory evidence on record to establish that the appellant(AO1) had handled the tainted currency notes as claimed by the complainant(Mukka Ramesh). 

After a threadbare analysis and evaluation of the evidence, the SC bench held that the prosecution case was full of embellishments contradicting and doubting, and thus, it would not be safe to convict the appellant for having demanded and accepted the bribe money from the complainant(PW-1). It added, “At the cost of repetition, we may state that the manner in which M. Ashok S/o Abbaiah (a worker in the saw-mill) was associated as a panch witness in the trap proceedings, creates a grave doubt that the entire case was orchestrated against the appellant(AO1) at the instance of the said M. Ashok.” Therefore, the SC bench said that the prosecution has failed to bring home the charges against the appellant(AO1) by leading evidence that can be termed to be of unimpeachable character. Thus, the AO1(appellant), ‘deserves’ to be acquitted of the charges.