CHERIAN Vs. STATE OF KERALA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The revision petitioner is the 1 st accused in C.C.No.472/1995 on the file of the Judicial First Class Magistrate Court, Ranny and the appellant in Crl.A.No.178/1999 on the file of the Additional Sessions Court (Ad hoc)-I, Pathanamthitta. The offences alleged against the accused 1 and 2 are under Sections 477A, 468 and 408 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code (hereinafter referred to as the IPC ).

(2.) The prosecution case in brief is that the 1 st accused was the Secretary and the 2 nd accused was the Cashier of the Naranamoozhi No.3910 Service Co- operative Bank. PW2 a customer of the Bank had deposited an amount of Rs.28,500/- in his S.B. account on 10.3.1993 and another sum of Rs.2,500/- on 13.3.1993. Those amounts were credited in the passbook of PW2 as well as in the ledger folio of the Bank. On the very same day, other persons had purchased forms from the Bank worth Rs.2/-. Instead of entering the huge amounts deposited by PW2, accused 1 and 2 entered those remittances of Rs.2/- each towards the price of forms purchased by some others. Hence it is alleged that they had fabricated false entries in the registers and records of the Bank and misappropriated the money deposited by PW2 defrauding the Bank for a total sum of Rs.31,000/-. Thus, the accused had committed the aforesaid offences.

(3.) During the trial of the case, PWs.1 to 9 were examined and marked Exts.P1 to P24 on prosecution side. On closing the evidence of the prosecution, the accused were questioned under Section 313(1)(b) of the Cr.P.C. They denied all the incriminating circumstances appearing in the evidence against them. However, no defence evidence was adduced.