Allahabad High Court Grants Bail To SP Leader Mohd Azam Khan, His Wife And Son In Fake Birth Certificate Case
The Allahabad High Court has granted bail to Samajwadi Party Leader Mohammad Azam Khan, his wife and his son accused of acquiring fake birth certificates for personal gains.
The Court was considering Criminal revision petitions filed by Mohammad Azam Khan, his wife, Dr Tanzeen Fatima and son, Mohammad Abdullah Azam Khan, against the judgment and order of conviction and sentence passed by Sessions Judge in various criminal appeals under Sections 120-B, 420, 467, 468, 471 of the Indian Penal Code (‘IPC’).
The Bench of Justice Sanjay Kumar Singh observed, “It is a case of the prosecution that birth certificate dated 21.1.2015 is a forged and false document, but the person, who made, signed, sealed and executed, has not been prosecuted, neither his statement under section 161 Cr.P.C was recorded nor he was produced before the trial court. So far as Section 468 IPC is concerned, there must be a forgery for the purpose of cheating as defined under Section 415 IPC… The complainant Akash Saxena is not a person deceived by the revisionists, therefore, in view of Section 39 Cr.P.C, he had no locus to lodge FIR as the offence under Section 120-B, 420, 467, 471 IPC, for which the revisionists have been tried and convicted, are not covered under Section 39 of Cr.P.C. The ingredients/evidence of cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of any property is also lacking in this case, hence Section 420 IPC is also not made out.”
Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal appeared for the Revisionists while Advocate General Ajay Kumar Mishra, Additional Advocate General P.C. Srivastava and AGA J.K. Upadhyay appeared for the Respondents.
It was the case of the Prosecution that on a written complaint by the Informant Akash Saxena, who is a Regional Convener, Bhartiya Janata Party Small Scale Industry Cell, an FIR was registered alleging that Azam Khan and his wife by forgery and hatching a well-planned conspiracy for their gain got two birth certificates of their son issued from two places and he travelled abroad by wrongly using it.
The Court held, “It is well settled that conjectures and suspicions should not be allowed to take place of legal proof in view of Section 3 of the Evidence Act. At times, it can be a case of ‘may be true’, but there is a long mental distance between ‘May be true’ and ‘Must be true’ and the same divides conjectures from sure conclusions…It is also well settled that whoever forges a document purporting to be a valuable security is an offence under Section 467 IPC and using of that forged document as genuine is offence under Section 471 IPC. There is no evidence on record to establish that any of the revisionists have forged the birth certificate dated 21.1.2015.”
The Court also said that the allegation of the prosecution in the FIR that the second birth certificate issued by the Municipal Corporation, Lucknow in January 2015 based on a duplicate birth certificate issued by Queen Mary’s Hospital, Lucknow issued in April 2015 was not possible at all, as the same was of a later date, therefore, the Court opined that the stand of the prosecution in this regard was wholly misconceived as no prudent person can ever reach on the conclusion that any certificate can be issued in January 2015 based on a document of April 2015.
The Court, thoroughly, discussed the ingredients of the offences of cheating and forgery, and concluded, “In view of the above, considering the facts and circumstances of the case in totality, nature of allegations, role attributed to the revisionists, material evidence on the record, submissions advanced on behalf of the parties concerned and reasons as noted above, this Court is of the view that the application under Section 389(1) Cr.P.C. of the revisionists for suspension of their sentence dated 18.10.2023 (affirmed by the order dated 23.12.2023 of the appellate court) during pendency of above mentioned Criminal Revisions is liable to be allowed.”
The Court also noted that 92 criminal cases are pending against Mohammad Azam Khan, 35 criminal cases pending against Tanzeen Fatima and 46 criminal cases pending against Mohammad Abdullah Azam Khan.
Accordingly, the Court suspended the impugned order of sentence during the pendency of criminal revisions, granted bail to all three of them, stayed/suspended the judgment and order of conviction qua Azam Khan during the pendency of these criminal revisions and rejected the prayer for stay of judgement and order of conviction qua Dr Tanzeen Fatima and Mohammad Abdullah Azam Khan.
Cause Title: Dr Tanzeen Fatima v. State of U.P. and other matters.
Appearances:
Revisionists: Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, Advocates Imran Ullah, Mohammad Khalid and Zubair Ahmad Khan.
Respondents: Advocate General Ajay Kumar Mishra, Additional Advocate General P.C. Srivastava, AGA J.K. Upadhyay, GA A.K. Sand, Advocates Sameer Srivastav and Sharad Sharma.