Delhi HC sets aside trial court order in 37-yr-old theft case

New Delhi: The Delhi high court recently set aside a trial court order imposing a cost of Rs 10,000 on the director of prosecution of the CBI for causing delay in the trial of a 37-year-old theft case.

Justice Vinod Goel also said that simply because a senior public prosecutor was transferred and another prosecutor was posted, “there was no authority for the special judge (trial court) to question the transfer of senior public prosecutor” by the authorities concerned in the CBI. The court’s order came on a plea by the CBI challenging the trial court’s September 2017 order of passing strictures against the agency and its director of prosecution.

The trial court had also imposed a cost of Rs 10,000 on the Director of Prosecution, CBI for causing delay in adjudication of the sessions case by not posting a senior public prosecutor well in advance before the previous prosecutor was relieved. Setting aside the trial court’s direction, the high court observed, “The special judge order was without any authority, jurisdiction or justification”. “Having considered the facts of the present case in the aforesaid context it was not expected from the special judge either to write a letter to the director, Central Bureau of Investigation requesting him to cancel the transfer order of the senior public prosecutor (Sr PP) posted in his court. He was also not empowered to act beyond his jurisdiction i.e. subject matter of the dispute pending before him. It was not the jurisdiction or authority of special judge to question the transfer of senior PP posted in the court” it noted.

“Posting and transfers of the public prosecutors in CBI is the prerogative of director of prosecution, CBI or director CBI. It is the director of prosecution, who has the administrative and superintending control in the matter of posting and transfer of the public prosecutors in different special courts across the country”, the high court observed.