CHANDIGARH: Rejecting the bail plea of an "arhtiya" (commission agent) who had allegedly not paid the amount received from the Punjab government to farmers for procurement of their crops, the Punjab and Haryana high court has observed that "it would be perversity of justice and injustice to farmers if the middle men usurping the price of farmers crops are allowed to go scot-free".
The HC has observed, “... Leniency and misplaced sympathy cannot be shown to the petitioners by granting concession of pre-arrest bail to them by ignoring the plight of the complainant/ farmers, who do hard work and put in lot of efforts in the agricultural operation hoping to get reward for such efforts in having good crops and then to earn their livelihood by sale of such crops."
Justice H S Madaan of the HC has passed these orders while dismissing the anticipatory bail plea of Vijay Kumar and his wife, who are commission agents. A case of cheating, criminal conspiracy and breach of trust was filed against them on the complaint of several farmers from Lassoi village of Sangrur.
As per the allegations, accused Vijay Kumar and his whole family had been working as commission agents at Lassoi village and purchased Kharif (rice crop) from farmers but did not make the payment to the concerned farmers according to J forms.
‘Old age or ailments won’t help accused escape arrest’
It was also stated that the accused owned four houses in Malerkotla, two big plants in industrial areas, a cold store on Ludhiana Road, two rice shellers at Lassoi village and 130 bighas of agricultural land. The farmers had alleged that these properties had been bought with the money belonging to the innocent farmers.
On December 29, a local court in Sangrur had dismissed the accused’s plea for prearrest bail. In their plea before the HC for bail, the accused contended that as per normal practice in the villages, the farmers receive money from the commission agent from time to time, which is finally adjusted against the money payable to them as price of the crops sold by them through the commission agent.
On this, the HC observed, “Counsel for the petitioners has just referred to a general practice without specifying as to how much amount had been received by which of the complainant... No copies of account books in support of such contentions have been placed on record."
The HC also observed that their old age or ailments cannot help them in escaping arrest and custodial interrogation, which in this case is found to be necessary to recover the misappropriated money belonging to the farmers.