E-Paper
Impersonation case: UP man acquitted by Ambala court
According to the FIR, the man had claimed to be an IAF officer to befriend a serving junior commissioned officer’s daughter on Facebook
An Ambala court has acquitted a man, who had impersonated an Indian Air Force (IAF) flight lieutenant, citing that the prosecution failed to prove its case.
Ankit Dubey, a resident of Etawah in Uttar Pradesh, claiming to be posted with 29 Wing in Allahabad, had befriended a serving junior commissioned officer (JCO)’s daughter on Facebook and expressed a desire to marry her in 2016.
The family, however, claimed they had verified details and found him to be fake. A complaint was lodged by a lieutenant colonel, officer commanding, Ambala Cantt, on March 28, 2016. Dubey was accused of carrying a token used by soldiers, personating as public servant, cheating, criminal conspiracy among other crimes.
On August 23, the court had observed: “...civil cases are decided upon preponderances of probabilities, but the criminal case are decided only on absolute proof i.e. prosecution or complainant must prove its case beyond reasonable doubt…the prosecution has to prove its case beyond shadow of reasonable doubts and if any doubt creeps in the story of the prosecution then benefit of doubt must be given to the accused.”
As per the court order made available on August 26, the court of Neelam Kumari, judicial magistrate first class, said that however strong the suspicion is, it cannot take the place of proof.
“...it may be that the accused has committed the offence in question, but there is a long way to travel between ‘may be true’ and ‘must be true’ and this whole distance has to be travelled by the prosecution,” the order read.
Dubey’s counsel Saurabh Ahuja said that his client was on bail since 2016 and had initially spent almost two months in judicial custody: “He was acquitted of all the charges and released.”
Primarily, the court in its judgment pointed out that the girl had not been examined, who had first-hand knowledge of facts of the case and was allegedly cheated on.
The court said that the prosecution had also failed to examine anyone from IAF based in Ambala Cantt or from 29 Wing in Allahabad to prove the fact that Dubey’s ID was fake, adding that no independent witness had joined at the time of the ID’s recovery by the police. Similarly, nobody had seen the accused wearing the IAF uniform, added the court.
