The Delhi High Court has quashed the conviction of retired Major General Anand Kumar Kapoor in the disproportionate assets case after ten years, holding that the lower court had adopted an unduly technical and hasty approach by prematurely closing the defense evidence without giving him a reasonable opportunity to cross-examine his remaining witnesses.
A bench of Justice Jasmeet Singh, in its ruling on Wednesday, also found serious flaws in how the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) obtained punishment for prosecution.
The Supreme Court said: “…the trial court proceeded to close the appellant’s evidence without affording any further opportunity, causing serious prejudice to the defence…”
Kapoor, who joined the Indian Army in 1971, was booked by the RBI in 2007 for amassing assets disproportionate to his known sources of income during his service until 2006.
In September 2016, a lower court convicted him under the Prevention of Corruption Act and sentenced him to one year of rigorous imprisonment and a fine of $50,000 and also ordered the confiscation of assets worth $2.22 Crores.
Kapoor appealed the conviction in the Supreme Court, arguing through his lawyer, Vivek Kohli, that the investigation was flawed and the prosecution’s punishment was invalid.
He also asserted that he was denied a fair trial after the court closed his defense evidence during the lawyers’ strike, even though only four of the nine proposed defense witnesses were questioned.
CBI Special Public Prosecutor Rajesh Kumar defended the conviction, asserting that adequate opportunity had been provided to Kapoor and that the trial court was acting in accordance with the Supreme Court’s directions to conclude the proceedings by September 2016.
