- (1.) J. C. Mishra, J. This revision is directed against the order dated 9-10-98 passed by Special Judge (Prevention of Corruption Act) U. P. Lucknow holding that the sanction for prosecution granted by the Assistant General Manager is valid. The accused Santosh Kumar Shukla has challenged the order on the ground that the sanctioning authority had not seen all relevant papers and there was total non-application of mind and consequently the sanction is invalid and on its basis the revisionist could not be prosecuted.
(2.) HEARD Sri Nandit Kumar Srivastava, assisted, by Sri P. Chakravarty, the learned Counsel for the revisionist and Sri Biteshwar Nath, learned Government Ad vocate. The accused was posted as At-tender in U. P. Jal Nigam Extension Counter of Syndicate Bank, Lucknow during the period from 1987 to 1989. The prosecution case is that he entered into criminal conspiracy with some unknown persons with the object of defrauding the said Bank by abusing his Official position as such public servant and thereby caused monetary loss to the Bank t6 the tune1 of Rs. 3, 31, 700 and thereby committed of fence punishable under Section 120-B, 419,420,467,468 and 471, I. P. C. and Sec tion 13 (2) read with Section 13 (1) (d) of the Prevention of-Corruption Act. The case was investigated by C. B. I, who submitted charge-sheet against tile revisionist on 12-11-92. The sanction for prosecution was granted by Sri S. P. Jain, Assistant General Manager, Syndicate Bank prior to submission of charge- sheet by order" dated 13-3-92. The learned Judge took cog nizance of the case framed charges and proceeded to examine prosecution wit nesses. The prosecution examined Sri S-P. Jain, Deputy General Manager who stated that at the relevant time he was posted as Assistant General Manager, Lucknow and was competent to remove the accused from service. He stated that after considering the report submitted by C. B. Iand gist of evidence of the prosecution accorded sanction for prosecution of the accused revisionist. It appears that while the prosecu tion evidence was being recorded the ac cused challenged the sanction order primarily on the ground that there was no application of mind and consequently the sanction is not valid and secondly on the ground that the sanctioning authority had no power to accord sanction.
(3.) THE learned Counsel for the revisionist contended that admittedly Shri Jain, the sanctioning authority had not perused all the documents nor the confes sional statement of the accused and fur ther he did not consider whether any other employee was involved in the offence or not and consequently there was non- application of mind. He also pointed out that though Shri. Jain has claimed that he had perused the file of the departmental enquiry but in the cross-examination he had to admit that no evidence was recorded during the said enquiry and consequently this departmental proceeding would not have been of any help to the officer in finding whether the accused was prima facie guilty of the offence complained, THE learned Counsel also contended that Sri Jain has passed his order according sanc tion on the basis of the report of C. B. Iand, therefore, the order is invalid. So far as legal question is con cerned it cannot be disputed that sanction accorded only on the basis of the report of the Investigating Agency is invalid. It is duty of the prosecution to place before the authority all the relevant materials includ ing the statement recorded by the Inves tigating Officer (State of Tamil Nadu v. M. M. Rajendran; 1998 SCC (Cri.) 100. In the case before. the Supreme Court the relevant materials including the statement recorded by the Investigating Officer had not been placed for consideration by the City Commission of Police, Madras and only a report of the Vigilance Department was placed before him. It was observed that even if report is a detailed one, such report cannot be held to be the complete record required to be considered for sanction on. application of mind to the relevant materials on record and, therefore, the sanction is invalid.;