The Supreme Court has held that the mere presence of a public servant at the place where a bribe is allegedly accepted is insufficient to infer criminal conspiracy, reiterating that the prosecution must establish a prior meeting of minds through cogent evidence.

A Bench of Justice Pankaj Mithal and Justice Prasanna B. Varale dismissed appeals filed by the State of Uttar Pradesh against an Allahabad High Court judgment acquitting three Central Excise officers accused of participating in a bribery conspiracy.

The case arose from a 1995 CBI trap in which Superintendent of Central Excise R.K. Srivastava was alleged to have demanded Rs.80,000 as illegal gratification for returning documents seized from a factory. The prosecution alleged that Inspectors A.K. Gaba, Alok Gupta and Dushyant Kumar were part of the conspiracy, primarily because they were present during the alleged demand or acceptance of the bribe.

While the trial court convicted the accused for criminal conspiracy and offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, the High Court reversed the conviction after finding that the prosecution had failed to establish demand, acceptance and conspiracy

Affirming the acquittal, the Supreme Court held that such circumstances, by themselves, could not establish the offence of criminal conspiracy under Section 120B IPC.

"The conspiracy cannot be inferred merely on the basis of suspicion or association and there must be cogent material indicating meeting of minds between the accused persons," the Court observed. It added that to establish conspiracy, "knowledge about indulgence in either an illegal act or a legal act by illegal means is necessary. The offence is complete when there is meeting of minds."

The Bench noted that, except alleging the presence of the respondents at certain places during the relevant period, the prosecution had failed to produce any substantive evidence showing a prior agreement or concert between them and the principal accused.

“In the case at hand, except alleging presence of the respondents at certain places during the relevant period, the prosecution has failed to produce any substantive evidence indicating prior agreement or concert between the respondents and the principal accused R.K. Srivastava.”, the Court observed.

The Court said that the prosecution failed to establish the prior meeting of minds between the accused persons, to make the Appellant liable for criminal conspiracy, as mere presence during the alleged acceptance of a bribe by the superior official would not be sufficient to hold the Appellant guilty for criminal conspiracy.

“The conspiracy cannot be inferred merely on the basis of suspicion or association and that there must be cogent material indicating meeting of minds between the accused persons. To establish a charge of conspiracy, knowledge about indulgence in either an illegal act or a legal act by illegal means is necessary. The offence is complete when there is meeting of minds.”, the Court observed.

“…the prosecution failed to establish the charge of conspiracy under Section 120-B IPC. On a well-settled principle that for establishing the charge of conspiracy, the pre-requisite is satisfactory evidence to show that there was meeting of mind of the accused so as to hatch up the conspiracy and then to act so as to give effect to the hatched conspiracy. On this aspect also, the prosecution miserably failed.”, the court added, referencing State (NCT of Delhi) v. Navjot Sandhu, (2005) 11 SCC 600.

Another factor that weighed in the Court's decision in the Respondent's favour was the failure of the prosecution to prove the factum of demand of a bribe against the Respondent, rendering their acquittal under Section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, as well as for the offence of criminal conspiracy valid.

“The High Court has rightly noted that even according to the prosecution story, the principal allegation of demand was against R.K. Srivastava alone. No independent material has been brought on record to show that the respondents actively participated in the alleged demand or shared the criminal intent necessary to constitute conspiracy.”, the Court said.

Another significant factor noticed by the Court was the prosecution's failure to produce a tape recording that, according to the complainant, captured the alleged demand for bribe. The Bench held that withholding such crucial electronic evidence justified drawing an adverse inference against the prosecution, referring to the decision in Tomaso Bruno v. State of Uttar Pradesh.

In terms of the aforesaid, the appeal was dismissed.

Cause Title: STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH VERSUS A.K.GABA ETC.

Citation : 2026 LiveLaw (SC) 644

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Appearance:

For Petitioner(s) Mr. Brijender Chahar, A.S.G. Mr. Mukesh Kumar Maroria, AOR Mr. Bhuvan Kapoor, Adv. Mr. Bhuvan Mishra, Adv. Mr. Abhijeet Pandove, Adv. Mr. Sanjay Kumar Tyagi, Adv.

For Respondent(s)/ R-1 and 3 Mr. R K Kapoor, Adv. (argued by) Mr. Rajat Kapoor, Adv. Mr. Rajat Kapoor, Adv. Ms. Sushmita Kaur, Adv. Ms. Kheyali Singh, AOR

R-2 Mr. Rajeev Kumar Bansal, AOR (argued by) Mr. Parvinder, Adv. Mr. Brijesh Kumar Yadav, Adv. Mr. Siddharth Singh, Adv. Mr. Viplav Kumar Singh, Adv. Mr. K.jayakaran, Adv. Mrs. Shefali Jain, Adv.