# AJENDRA NATH v. STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH

- **Citation:** [1964] 3 S.C.R. 289
- **Court:** Supreme Court of India
- **Decided:** 1964
- **Case number:** Criminal Appeal No. 226 of 1960
- **Bench:** K. Subba Rao, Raghubab Dayal, J. R. Mudholkar
- **Source:** https://unisonlegal.in/judgment/supreme-court-of-india/ajendra-nath-v-state-of-madhya-pradesh-2893
- **Pages:** 9

## Headnote

Criminal Trial-Property reco~ered not protoed to be 1lole11
properly-Acquittal by Se.sion8 Jwlge-State appeal agairwl
few-Allowed agaimt the app£llant-Flnding
01& Ile qw•on
reverm1-High Court, if could record ita o .. n flnding1-AHi1·
tanct in concealment of ·•lolen property-Scope of-1111.ian
Penal Code (Act 46 of 1860), ss. 120-B, 379, 414.
Five bales, containing woollen shawls and
muft'lcra
despatched from Kanpur by the British India Corporation Ltd.
and another bale despatched from Haimanpur to Kanpur,
were loaded in wagon at I tarsi rail way station. The leek of the
wagon was found broken open and on checking at Nagpur the
aforesaid bales were
found mi•sing. On search, certain
articles including some torn labels were recovered from the
house of one Gopi Nath. The same day the appellant and
few other persons were found by the Police, c0ming out of
Gopi Nath's house whose front door was locked. They were
taken to the Police Station and at the instance of the appellant,
the police recovered woollen shawls, mufflers, bed 1heets and
certain house-breaking implements from different place1 of that
house. After investigation, six persons Including the appellant
were put on trial before the Magistrate for several charge1
under ss. 120•B, 379 and 414 of the Indian Penal Code and
except one Birendra Nath, all were convicted. On appeal,
all the convicted persons were acquitted by the Additional
Sessions Judge, on further appeal by the State, against the
acqui:tal of Gopinath and the appellant, the High Court
allowed the appeal only against the appellant with respect to
the offence under s. 414 of the Indian Penal Code. On appeal
by special leave, this Court held :
H eU1 that the mere fact that the other accused per110D1
were acquitted on the ground that the property recovered wao
not proved to be stolen property did not preclude the State
from appealing against the acquittal of the appellant against
196S
..f;ril 2J.
196J
.djmdra Nath
v.
Stattaf MadhJa
· Puidtsh
Raghubar DaJal. J,
290 SUPREME COURT REPORTS (1964] VOL.
whom there Is better evidence. The State could challenge the
correctness of
the findings of the
Additional
Seuion•
- Judge about the property being stolen property and the
High Court could record its own 'findings on that question.
Held further, that it Is not necessary for a person to be
convicted under s. 414 Indian Penal Code that another person
must be traced out and convict,d of an offence of committing
theft. The prosecution ha1 simply to establish that the
property recovered is stolen property and that the appellant
provided help in its concealment and disposal; Th• circum·
stances of the_ recovery in the present case sulficiently prove
that the appellant had assisted in the concealment of the stolen
property
and had thus committed the offence under 1. 414
Indian Penal Code. The appeal therefore, mll!t be dismi8'ed.

## Text

3 S.C.R. SUPREME COURT REPORTS
280
AJENDRA NATH
v.
STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH
(K. SUBBA RAO, RAGHUBAB DAYAL and
J. R. MUDHOLKAR JJ.)
Criminal Trial-Property reco~ered not protoed to be 1lole11
properly-Acquittal by Se.sion8 Jwlge-State appeal agairwl
few-Allowed agaimt the app£llant-Flnding
01& Ile qw•on
reverm1-High Court, if could record ita o .. n flnding1-AHi1·
tanct in concealment of ·•lolen property-Scope of-1111.ian
Penal Code (Act 46 of 1860), ss. 120-B, 379, 414.
Five bales, containing woollen shawls and
muft'lcra
despatched from Kanpur by the British India Corporation Ltd.
and another bale despatched from Haimanpur to Kanpur,
were loaded in wagon at I tarsi rail way station. The leek of the
wagon was found broken open and on checking at Nagpur the
aforesaid bales were
found mi•sing. On search, certain
articles including some torn labels were recovered from the
house of one Gopi Nath. The same day the appellant and
few other persons were found by the Police, c0ming out of
Gopi Nath's house whose front door was locked. They were
taken to the Police Station and at the instance of the appellant,
the police recovered woollen shawls, mufflers, bed 1heets and
certain house-breaking implements from different place1 of that
house. After investigation, six persons Including the appellant
were put on trial before the Magistrate for several charge1
under ss. 120•B, 379 and 414 of the Indian Penal Code and
except one Birendra Nath, all were convicted. On appeal,
all the convicted persons were acquitted by the Additional
Sessions Judge, on further appeal by the State, against the
acqui:tal of Gopinath and the appellant, the High Court
allowed the appeal only against the appellant with respect to
the offence under s. 414 of the Indian Penal Code. On appeal
by special leave, this Court held :
H eU1 that the mere fact that the other accused per110D1
were acquitted on the ground that the property recovered wao
not proved to be stolen property did not preclude the State
from appealing against the acquittal of the appellant against
196S
..f;ril 2J.
196J
.djmdra Nath
v.
Stattaf MadhJa
· Puidtsh
Raghubar DaJal. J,
290 SUPREME COURT REPORTS (1964] VOL.
whom there Is better evidence. The State could challenge the
correctness of
the findings of the
Additional
Seuion•
- Judge about the property being stolen property and the
High Court could record its own 'findings on that question.
Held further, that it Is not necessary for a person to be
convicted under s. 414 Indian Penal Code that another person
must be traced out and convict,d of an offence of committing
theft. The prosecution ha1 simply to establish that the
property recovered is stolen property and that the appellant
provided help in its concealment and disposal; Th• circum·
stances of the_ recovery in the present case sulficiently prove
that the appellant had assisted in the concealment of the stolen
property
and had thus committed the offence under 1. 414
Indian Penal Code. The appeal therefore, mll!t be dismi8'ed.
CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Criminal
Appeal No. 226 of 1960.
Appeal by special leave from the judgment and
order dated July 28, 1960 of the Madhya Pra.desh
High Court in Criminal Appeal No. 385 of 1959.
A. R. Ohoubay and Naunit Lal, for the appellant.
I. N. Shroff, for the respondent.
1963. April 23. The Judgment of the Court
was delivered by
RAGHUBAR DAYAL J.-This appeal, by special
leave, is directed against the order of the High Court
of Madhya Pradesh reversing, on State appeal, the
order of the Additional Sessions Judge, Hoshangabad, acquiting the appellant, and convicting him
of an offence under s. 414 l.P.C.
Five bales, containing woolll'o shawls 2nd
mufflers despatched from Kanpur by the British India
Corporation Ltd., Kanpur Woollen Mills Branch,
Kanpur,
and
another
bale
despatched from
,
3 S.C.R. SUPREME COURT REPORTS
291
Haimanpur to Kanpur were loaded at !tarsi railway
station on September !8, 1957, in Wagon No. C.R.
325. The lock of the wagon was found broken open
at Pandhurna Railway Mation at about 1.00 a.m.
on September 20, 1957.
Un checking at Nagpur
the aforesaid bales were found missing.
One of
the bales despatched from Kanpur was found lying
the next morning near the railway line between
railway stations J aulkheda and Multai.
On September 23, 1957, the house of one Gop!
Nath, at Multai, was searched and certain articles,
jncluding some torn labels were recovered frolll
that house.
The same day, the police found the appellant
and a few other persons come out of Gopi Nath's
house <'.t. Betul, whose front door was locked.
Subsequently, these persons were taken to the police
station, where the
appellant made a statement
showing readiness to point out the stolen property.
At his instance, the police recovered from different
places of that house, woollen shawls, mufflen, bed·
sheets and certain house-breaking implements. These
recoveries were made on September 23 and 24.
As a remit of investigation, six persons were
put on trial in the Magistrate's Court.
Ajendra
Nath, appellant, was charged under ss. 120·B, 379
and 414, I.P.C. Babu Ram was charged under
ss. 120·B and 379 I.P.C. Ram Prasad and Gyani
were charged under s. 120-B read withs. 379 I.P.C.,
Gopinath under s. 120-B read with s. 414 I.P.C.,
and Birendranath under
~. 414 l.P.C.
The learned
Magistrate acquitted Birendra Nath and convicted
the other accused of the offence under s. 120-B read
withs. 379 I.P.C., except in
the case of Gopinath,
who was convicted of the offence under s. 120-B
read with s. 414 I.P.C. Ajendra Nath was alJg
convicted of the offence under i. 414 I.P.C.
116:1
A.j1ndra NaJh
v.
Stal1of Ma•
Prailth
292 SUPREME COURT REPORTS[l964) VOL,
J.jmdra Nath
v.
Sl<U•f Madl!J!a
traiuh
On appeal, the learned Additional Sessions
Judge, Hoshangabad, acquitted all these convicted .
persons.
He held that the property recovered was
not proved to be stolen property and that the
allegt>d conspiracy was not proved. The State filed
an appeal against the acquittal of Gopinath and
Ro.ghu b 1r Dayal J.
Ajendra Nath. The High Court dismissed the
appeal against Gopinath and the appeal against
Ajendra Nath for the offence of conspiracy. It
however allowed the appeal against Ajendra Nath
with respect to the offence under s. 414 I.P.C. It
is against this order that this appeal has been filed
by Ajendra Nath, appellant.
Ajendra Nath did not question the recovery
of the. various articles from Gopi Nath's house at
Betul at his instance. He did not claim the property
to be his own, but stated that it was not stolen property. The main contention for the appellant in this
Court has been that these recovered article~ were
not proved to be stolen property. The
articles
consisted of those said to have been sent by the
British India Corporation Ltd., Kanpur Woollen
Mills Branch, Kanpur, and bed.sheets sent by the
firm of V.S.N.C. N arsingha Chettiar, which carries
on business of wholesale Hand Loom Cloth at
Karur.
The invoices relating to the four bales sent by
the Kanpur Woollen Mills give the details of the
shawls and mufflers the bales contained. A very
large quantity of these has been recovered. Out of
95 shawls and 63 mufflers, as many as 80 shawls
and 43 mufflers had been recovered. Similarly, out
of 10 pairs of bed-sheets stolen, 8 pairs have been
recovered. The absence of any adequate explai;i·
ation for the presence of such a large quantity of
articles similar to those proved to h:we l;>een des·
patched by the Kanpur Woollen Mills or by the
Karur company, the recovery of these articles within
3 S.C.R.
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
293
a few days of the theft, the presence of silk and paper
labels of Kanpur Woollen Mills on most of the
shawls and mufflers recovered and of certain manu·
script writings on the labels of the bed sheets by
P.W. 24 Krishnamurthi, brother of P.W. 16, Venkat
Raman, who does the Karur business, have been
taken into consideration by the
High Cciurt for
coming to the finding that the property
recovered
was proved to be stolen property. These circums·
tances cannot be said to be such which would not
justify the finding arrived at.
The main contention for the appellant however
is that it has not been definitely established from the
evidence of Kunzru, P. W. 10, that the shawls, mufflers recovered were manufactured by the Kanpur
Woollen Mills and were despatched in the bales which
were subsequently stolen. Kunzru's evidence docs
fall short of establishing that the shawls and mufflers
recovered were manufactured by the Kanpur Woollen
Mills. He has not identified the recovered shawls
aad mufflers as those manufactured by these mills.
In fact, he was not even shown all the shawh and
mufflers recovered. · He was shown by the Police
Inspector, Government Railway Police,- two lois
(two shawls) and two mufflers. He got them examined by the textile expert and, on the report of the
expert, gave the certificate that they appeared to be
manufactured by the Woollen Mills of Kanpur. That
expert has not been examined in Court and therefore
Kunzru 's statement alone fails to establish that these
shawls and mufflers were manufactured by these mills.
However, it is not open to doubt that they were
manufactured by these mills when most of them had
sewn silk labels of these mills and quite a good
number of them had even paper labels mdicating
that they were manufactured by these mills. There,
is no reason to suppose and in fact no such sugges.
tion has been made that these labels had been put
on these article• by some one for the purpose of
I96J
.Ajen'r• Narfi
••
Stat• of MaJhya
Prod1sA
Razhubar D<3al J,
J.S63
.Ajandra Nath
v.
Stoll nj MaJkJa
P1ad1sh
Ra:hubar Day1il J.
294 SUPREME COURT RE.PORTS [1964] VOL.
deception. We therefore consider that the finding that
these shawls and muffiers were the manufacture of
Kanpur Woollen Mills is correct.
It was also contended for the appellant that it
was not proved that these shawls and muffiers were
in the bates which were despatched by the Kanpur
· Woollen Mills and that the gate passes and the invoices produced by Kunzru were not proved as persons.
who wrote them had not been examined. Kunzru
produced the originals of these documents.
He is
the salesman of the Kanpur Woollen .Mills. His crossexamination in no way indicates that his statement
about the genuineness of the invoices and gate. passes
was questioned in cross-examination. There is nothing
to suppose that the invoices and gate passes produced
in Court did not correctly represent the articles
placed inside particular bales to which specific numbers were given and that those bales were despatched
from the Mills in accordance with the gate passes.
In this connection reference was made to the fact
that five of the shaw.ls recovered were of violet colour
and no shawl of such a colour was mentioned in any
of the invoices. There can be a possibility of a misdescription in the invoices, There can be a possibility of the violet shawls being the property stolen
in some other incident. The fact remains that even
the violet shawls are not claimed by the appellant
as his own. So, we do not consider any force in
this contention for considering the finding of the
High Court defective about the property recovered
to be stolen property.
With respect to the identity of the bed-sheets,
there is the evidence of P.Ws. 16 and 24.
P.W.16
deposed that he had supplied IO pairs of bed-sheets to
a certain customer who disowned the bale. Thereupon he asked the Station Master, Ahimanpur to
return the parcel to Karur.
He recognized the
various sheets to be of his firm which they had
,
., .
3 S.C.R.
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
295
despatched to Ahimanpur. He further deposed that
before despatching the goods they paste the firm
labels on them. He stated that his younger brother
Krishna Murti had noted size·number and pattern
over these sheets in his hand.writing, as he happened
to be at home on vacation. Krishna Murti, P.W.24,
admits that certain labels on the bed-sheets were in
his hand· writing, that he wrote them under instructions of his brother and that he had not written similar numbers on any other bed-sheets.
He however
stated subsequently that he did such type of markings
casually, on occasions, and that the Sub-Inspector had
also got him write the size, pattern etc., on certain
other blank labels of the shop as well.
The learned Additional Sessions Judge did not
rely on these statements and felt that the Investigating Officer might have got those markings on the
labels of the recovered articles during the investigation. The High Court thought that there was no
reason for doubting the correctness of the statements
of these witnesses· and for suspecting that the writings
on the labels were obtained during the investigation.
No question was put to P.W. 24 about the police
making him write on the labels on the recovered
articles. In fact, according to the witness, labels
with his writings were qhown to him for purposes of
recognition and he recognized those writings to be
his.
The police took his writings on blank labels
for purposes of comparison. We therefore see no good
reason for considering the finding of the High Court
with respect to the bed-sheets recovered to be stolen
property to be wrong.
It was also contended that it was not open to
the High Court to record a finding about -the recovered property to be stolen property when the Government had not appealed against the other co·accused
who were acquitted on the basis of the finding that
the property recovered was not proved to be stolen
196J
Aj1ndra Nt;l/t.
v.
St.11 oj .lfadlrJ•
p,atJ1sla
Razhuhar D'!Jal I.
1963
A,j1odra Nath
v,
Sttte Qf Madhya
Prod11h
Ra1hrfar Dayal J.
296
SUPREME COURT REPORTS [1964] VOL.
property. We do not see any force in this contention.
The mere fact that the learned Additional S".ssions
Judge acquitted the other accused on the ground that
the property recovered was not proved to be stolen
property did not preclude the State from appealing
against the acquittal of the appellant against whom
there is better evidence for establishing that he was in
possession of the stolen property than the evidence was
against the other co-accused. The State could challenge the correctness of the findings of the learned
Additional Sessions Judge about the property being
stolen property and, consequently, the High Court
can record its own finding on that question.
Lastly, it was also urged that even if the identity of the articles recovered with the articles stolen
be established, no offence under s.414 LP.C. is made
out against the appellant as the other accused have
been acquitted and it is not known whom the appellant is supposed to have helped in concealing the
stolen property.
Section 414 I.P.C. makes it an
offence for a person to assist voluntarily in stealing
or disposing of or making away with property which
he knows or has reason to believe to be stolen property. It is not necessary for a person to be convicted
under s.414 I.P.C. that another person must be traced
out and convicted of an offence of committing theft.
The prosecution has simply to establish that the property recovered is stolen property and that the appellant provided help in its concealment and disposal.
The circumstances of the recovery sufficiently make
out that the property was deliberately divided into
different packets and was separately kept. May be
that the property falling to the share of a particular
thief was kept separately. It was recovered from
several different places in the same house. These
places included an iron safe and an underground
cellar. The evening before, several persons, including the appellant, were found to be coming out of
the back door of the house which had its front door
"
..
3 S.C.R..
SUPREME COURT R.EPOR.TS
297
locked. The appellant also knew the whereabouts
of the property inside the house of his maternal
grandfather.
He attempted to sell a few muffiers a
day before the recoveries were made.
He was seen
arriving at the house, during the night, in a car with
some persons and then removing property which
looked like bales from the car to the house.
All
these circumst.mces go to support the finding that
he had a~sisted in the concealment of the stolen property and had thus committed the offence under
s.414 I.P.C.
We therefore ·see no force in this appeal and,
accordingly, dismiss it.
Appeal dismissed.
STATE OF ANDHRA PRADESH
v.
CHEEMALAPATI GANESWARA RAO & ANR.
(K. SuBBA Ri1.o, RAGHUBA.R DAYAL and
j. R. MUDHOLKAR jj.)
Criminal Trial-'-Joind.er nf charg" and pers<»U- Oon•·
pirac71,
charge of-If illegal
after conspiracy fructifieaExamination of accmed-Right of accv•ed to examine him.ielf aa
witneM-lf duty of Oovrt to inform acc""ed of right-Pardota,
legality of-Approver-Refreshing memory by reference to document•-lf Pormiasible-AamiMibility of evidence-Account Boo"8
-Ab1enee of entrie. •f payment. aUeged -Gode of Criminal
ProceJure, 1898 (5 Bf 1~98), 81. 233 to 339,342,337,529,537Indian Evidence Act. 1872(1of1872), 81.ti,ll,34,lli9,1~~.
A and B were tried together at one trial, A of offences
under ss. 120-B, 409,477-A and 471 read with •· 476 Indian
Penal Code and B of offences under ss. 120-B,409 read with 109
1963
J.jm,ra Nath
••
Stal• •! '-fa1hJ•
Prad!1h
Raghubar Dayal /,