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An acquittal under a ministerial inquiry will not overshadow a trial in every criminal case, especially in cases where civil servants have been caught in the act of accepting bribe amount with prima facie evidence such as recorded conversation, proof of application or forensic confirmation of application etc., the Karnataka High Court said.
In principle, a departmental acquittal can affect prosecution, but it does not automatically extinguish it. Each case rests on its own factual and evidentiary matrix and a criminal case must be tested in the crucible of a full-fledged trial under a stricter standard of proof, the court said.
Justice M. Nagaprasanna made these observations while refusing to quash the criminal proceedings against petitioner Geeta R., Superintendent in the Office of the Deputy Registrar of Cooperative Societies, Chitradurga. In July 2018, she was caught red-handed when she allegedly accepted a bribe of ₹15,000 from a complainant for registering a cooperative.
However, the Inquiry Officer under the Lokayukta office in his ministerial inquiry report in 2023 exonerated her as the complainant had turned hostile and stated that he had not paid the bribe and that the money she had received was related to a certain hand loan from relatives. She submitted a proposal to cancel the criminal case, citing the acquittal in the departmental investigation.
No straight jacket pattern
There is “no binding formula” that mandates expungement of a criminal proceeding after an acquittal in a departmental proceeding merely because the two actions arise from the same factual basis, the Court said.
In cases where the trap has failed or where there is no direct evidence of demand and acceptance, the court said that an acquittal in a ministerial inquiry of this kind may indeed affect the maintainability of the criminal proceedings.
However, where there is prima facie evidence of demand and acceptance and where the amount is recovered from the hands of the delinquent employee/accused, when he is caught in the act of accepting tainted currency and the trap mahazar pulls out or documents whatever is required to be done to prove demand and acceptance, the court clarified that this would become prima facie evidence of demand and acceptance and such cases have to be examined at trial.
In the case of the petitioner, the court stated that she must come clean in the proper court proceedings that are currently underway.
Published – 10 March 2026 22:42 IST
