HC fines narcotics bureau for slapping false charges

KOLKATA: Calcutta High Court on Friday fined Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) Rs 1 lakh for implicating an innocent person in a case. A division Bench of Justice Girish Chandra Gupta and Justice K K Prasad allowed the appeal of north Kolkata resident Mohammad Selim Akhtar and acquitted him. He was serving a sentence of 10 years' imprisonment and languishing in jail since 1999. On July 19, 1999, NCB's intelligence officials arrested Debasish Datta and Akhtar from a restaurant at the crossing of Bowbazar and College Street. It was alleged that they were waiting for a customer. The officers had seized 570 gm heroine and some foreign currencies from Datta's possession. Nothing was recovered from Akhtar. The two, charged under sections 21 and 29 of the Narcotics, Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, 1985, were sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs 1 lakh each by the trail court on June 22, 2005. Though Akhtar appealed against that order in the high court in August 2005, his bail plea was shot down. Since then, he has been languishing in jail. His counsel argued that his client had been falsely implicated as nothing had been seized from him. The Bench, finally, acquitted Akhtar on the grounds that no offence had been substantiated against him.
17 May 2008, 0544 hrs IST , TNNTHE TIMES OF INDIA