CHENNAI: A special court for cases under the NDPS (Narcotic Drugs and Psycotropic Substances) Act in Chennai acquitted a 41-year-old man from West Bengal after finding several lapses in the prosecution case, notably the failure to prove that the man knew Hindi.
Mohammad Abdul Alim (41) of Birbhum was arrested by a team from the Pallikaranai Prohibition Enforcement Wing (PEW) on March 21, 2023, near East Tambaram. According to the prosecution, he was found with 30 kg of ganja in two bags.
An Armed Reserve (AR) Constable Imran Khan, who knew Hindi explained the arrest procedures to Alim and the latter knew Hindi too, according to the prosecution. However, the defence counsels argued that their client only knows Bangla and does not know Hindi and that the prosecution has made up the statements.
They also pointed out the suspect’s signatures in the documents which were not Hindi.
“It is the admitted case of prosecution that the accused belongs to West Bengal. (Then) his mother tongue should have been Bangla. Hence when a specific defence is taken by the accused that he did not know Hindi, the burden is upon the prosecution to disprove the defence taken by the accused,” noted Additional Special Judge S Govindarajan.
The court also noted that while the prosecution stated that two bags of ganja were seized, only one bag, with a lesser quantity than originally seized, was produced before the court.
The court pointed out that although police claimed to have verified Alim’s train ticket from West Bengal, the document was not submitted as evidence. And, there was also a delay of 27 days in producing the seized narcotics before the court.
“For these inconsistencies and discrepancies, this court comes to the conclusion that the prosecution has not proved the case beyond reasonable doubt,” the court said and held the accused as not guilty.