Supreme Court: Accused Does Not Have The Right To File Material Or Documents At The Stage Of Framing Of Charges

The Court allowed an Appeal filed by the State, setting aside an Order of the Andhra Pradesh High Court, which affirmed the Special Court's Order discharging the accused in a case involving alleged irregularities in cotton procurement by the Cotton Corporation of India (CCI). The Court directed the Special Court to re-examine the framing of charges under Section 239 of the CrPC.

The Bench of Justice Pankaj Mithal and Justice SVN Bhatti remarked, “Reverting to the circumstances of this case, it is borne out by the record that the plea for discharge is founded on the correspondence dated 08.01.2007 and 31.01.2007. Thereafter, by referring to the very gist of the communication, prayer for discharge has been made. In clear terms and reasoning, the discharge has been ordered not by referring to any of the situations referred in section 239 of the CrPC, but by relying on the documents made available by the accused. The procedure followed by the trial court and as confirmed by the High Court is patently illegal, and contrary to the binding precedent.”

ASG KM Nataraj appeared for the Appellant, while Senior Advocate Shoeb Alam represented the Respondent.

Brief Facts

The prosecution alleged that the accused purchased cotton from genuine farmers at lower prices before the announcement of the Minimum Support Price (MSP) and hoarded these stocks. Once CCI started purchasing at MSP, the accused allegedly resold the hoarded cotton under benami names of farmers to CCI at the higher MSP rates.

Before charges were framed, the accused filed a Petition to summon a letter from the CBI to the Deputy General Manager of CCI, Guntur, and CCI's reply. The CBI's letter queried about differences in purchases, deviation of rules, loss caused, complaints, audit objections, and unsold cotton. CCI's reply stated that purchases by the accused were as per MSP guidelines, no loss was caused, no complaints were received, and all purchases were sold.

Court’s Reasoning

The Supreme Court had to determine whether the two letters could have been looked at or relied upon by the special court for exercising its jurisdiction under Section 239 of the CrPC.

The Court referred to its decision in State of Orissa v. Debendranath Padhi (2005), wherein it was held that “the accused at the stage of framing of charge does not have a right to file material or documents…No provision in the Code grants to the accused any right to file any material or document at the stage of framing of charge. That right is granted only at the stage of the trial.”

“Discharge under the CrPC is salutary, and the magistrate, through the expression used in these sections, is under an obligation to discharge the accused where, from the chargesheet and the appended documents, it is noticed that the trial of such charges is worthless. Therefore, to sustain the exercise of discretion, the order of discharge conforms to the requirements of these sections,” the Bench remarked.

The Court held, “However, since the order of discharge is amenable to the jurisdiction of the revisional court, the order of discharge must speak for itself, and only a warranted conclusion is arrived at by the magistrate. The deviation from the discretionary limits definitely attracts the supervisory jurisdiction of the revisional courts. The issue of whether discharge is warranted or trial is continued depends on the circumstances of each case.”

Consequently, the Court ordered, “Hence, for the above discussion and reasons, the orders impugned are set aside, and the prayer for discharge of the accused by looking at the documents brought on record is set aside. Consequently, the Criminal MPs filed by the accused are dismissed. The special court is directed to exercise its jurisdiction in terms of section 239 of the CrPC, particularly, uninfluenced by any of the observations made in this Judgment, and decide whether a case for discharge is available or charges are to be framed for trial of the alleged offences. The Criminal Appeals are allowed. Pending applications, if any, are disposed of accordingly.”

Accordingly, the Supreme Court allowed the Appeal.

Cause Title: State v. Eluri Srinivasa Chakravarthi & Ors. (Neutral Citation: 2025 INSC 758)

Appearance:

Appellant: ASG K M Nataraj; Advocates Rukhmini Bobde, Anuj Srinivas Udupa, Vanshaja Shukla, Ashok Panigrahi and Seema Patnaha; AOR Mukesh Kumar Maroria

Respondent: Senior Advocate Shoeb Alam; Advocates Mahima Pandey, Mullapudi Rambabu, Sarthak Chandra, Dev Sareen, K V Girish Chowdary, D Sumanth; AOR Rajat Singh and Tatini Basu

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