Santosh Rai v. The State of Bihar
Case brief
What is this about?
Patna High Court, Cr. Appeal (SJ) Nos. 885 of 2023, 2430 of 2021 and 2746 of 2021 (common judgment, Chandra Shekhar Jha, J, 23-07-2024): appeals under Sections 374(2)/372(2) CrPC allowed; conviction under Section 20(b)(II)(c) NDPS Act and 10-year RI sentence with Rs. 1,00,000 fine (NDPS Case No. 34/2017, Barahara PS Case No. 302/2017, Bhojpur; ganja recovered from houses of Jodha Paswan, Santosh Rai, Sunil Kumar Singh @ Chutur Singh and Birendra Singh) set aside; all four appellants acquitted giving benefit of doubt. Key findings: Section 42 NDPS Act not complied with; Section 52A not followed; seized ganja not produced and destruction unexplained; improper sealing/sampling; Standing Order No. 1/1988 substantially flouted (Noor Aga 2008 (16) SCC 417 and Khet Singh relied on; Vijay Jain (2013) 14 SCC 527 applied on non-production of seized drug); conviction based only on official witnesses. Search terms: NDPS, ganja, Section 42, Section 52A, perfunctory investigation, benefit of doubt, acquittal, Magistrate-supervised raid, FSL report, Bhojpur/Barahara.