Complainant cop as IO no ground for acquittal, says HC

Chandigarh, February 5

Nearly six months back the Punjab and Haryana High Court held that complainant police officer could not be investigating officers in drug cases before asking Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh DGPs to send urgent wireless messages and circulars to all police stations and quarters concerned to act accordingly. But another Division Bench has now made it clear that an accused could not be acquitted on this ground alone.

The issue was raked up again before the Division Bench of Justice Rajiv Sharma and Justice Harinder Singh Sidhu after a counsel for a convict in a drugs case argued that the complainant and the investigation officer was the same, while indicating that it had resulted in miscarriage and caused prejudice to the appellant.

Referring to a plethora of judgments by the Supreme Court on the issue, Justice Sharma asserted the question in such a case was not whether the police disregarded the provisions of the NDPS Act in investigating an offence, but whether the accused had been prejudiced by such disregard. — TNS