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| Court acquits ZEO, headmaster after 14 years | | | early times report
Srinagar, June 3: The court of additional sessions judge anti corruption today acquitted two accused of charges of appointing a teacher whose certificates were found to be fake. The acquittal charge came after fourteen years after the prosecution failed to prove its case.
The Additional Sessions Judge Anticorruption Srinagar, Sanjeev Gupta acquitted Ghulam Rasool Lone the then Zonal Education officer and Ghulam Muhammad Bhat the then headmaster for appointing Mushtaq Ahmed Lone as a teacher on a fake certificate as the prosecution failed to prove its case beyond any reasonable doubt. According to the prosecution case the government decided to close all the schools run by Falahi Aam Trust (FAT). The students seeking education in the schools run by the trust were admitted in government schools. It was also decided to adjust all he teachers working full time in the trust would be adjusted in government run schools. It was alleged that the accused Mushtaq Ahmed Lone s/o Abdullah Lone r/o Banda Chalgam was not working as teacher in any school run by FAT nor had he applied for his appointment as teacher in the Govt School because his name did not figure in the list of 104 teachers appointed in the Govt schools out of 307 FAT teachers in District of Anantnag.
It was further alleged that the accused had not obtained any appointment order from the divisional commissioner's office or from director education. Accused Mushtaq, according to the prosecution case, was appointed as government teacher in high school Marhama, Kulgam by accused Ghulam Rasool Lone vide order No 295 dated September 1, 1990 in his capacity as ZEO Chawalgam in contravention of rules and regulations without any competence on the basis of forged and fake certificate produced by accused Mushtaq Ahmed wherein he claimed to be a teacher with the FAT. Subsequently accused Ghulam Mohd Bhat as then Headmaster of the said school allowed Mushtaq Ahmed to join as a teacher in the school on the basis of order issued by then ZEO. Thus ZEO and Headmaster by misuse of their official position caused illegal benefit to accused Mushtaq Ahmed enabling him to get pecuniary benefits at the cost of State exchequer. On the said allegations initially a case u/s 420/468/471/120-B RPC was registered and investigation commenced but later on it came to fore that act of accused ZEO and headmaster comes under criminal misconduct as such offence u/s 5 of PC Act 2006 was also added against them.
The presiding officer of the court, Sanjeev Gupta Additional after hearing Chief Prosecuting Officer for the Crime Branch and Advocate GN Dar appearing for the accused observed that from the facts and circumstances of the case, the prosecution has miserably failed to prove its case against the accused beyond all shadow of doubt in as much as neither the alleged criminal conspiracy hatched between the accused has been proved nor criminal misconduct via misuse of official position by the accused Ghulam Rasool and Ghulam Mohd Bhat was proved by the prosecution. The prosecution case is dismissed and accused are acquitted from the charges leveled against them.
With the acquittal of the accused persons the court held that the investigation was not done properly and effectively. The investigation was done by an officer of the rank of SP but unfortunately he has done his job in a casual manner without realizing the seriousness of the charges. Neither FIR nor sanction order in original were placed on the file which proved a major flaw in the prosecution case. The conduct of the IO of the case being a member of Premier Investigating Agency of the State leaves much to desire. With these observations Court acquitted all the three accused from the charges leveled against them. --JNF
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