TARUN TYAGI versus CENTRAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION

Citation: [2017] 1 S.C.R. 670 · Decided: 08-02-2017 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: A.K. SIKRI · Disposal: Appeal(s) allowed

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Judgment (excerpt)

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[2017] 1 S.C.R. 670 
TARUN TYAGI 
v. 
CENTRAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION 
(Criminal Appeal No. 102of2017) 
FEBRUARY 08, 2017 
[A. K. SIKRI AND R. K. AGRAWAL, JJ.] 
Code of Criminal Procedure, 197 3 - s. 207 - Supply to the 
accused of copy of police report and other documents - Allegation 
that appellant stole the 'source code of a software known as 'quick 
recovery developed by complainant's co111pany and put it on sale 
on the website of the appellant co111pany - Registration of case 
under the Information Technology Act and Copyright Act - Charge-
sheet filed by CBI relying on hard disks - Appellant sought release 
of seized property - Refusal to supply the hard disk and compact 
disk to the appellant by the courts below - Correctness of - Held: 
s. 207 puts an obligation on the prosecution to furnish to the 
accused, free of cost, copies of the docu111ents 111entioned, therein, 
without any delay - If documents are volu111inous, instead of 
furnishing the accused with the copy thereof, the magistrate can 
allow the accused to inspect it either personally or through pleader 
in the court - On facts, in order to comply with the provision of s. 
207, marked hard disks be supplied to appellant subject to certain 
conditions - Information Technology Act, 2000 - s. 66 - Copyright 
Act, 1957 - ss. 63, 63B - Penal Code, 1860 - s. 381. 
Allowing the appeals, the Court 
HELD: 1.1 Section 207 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 
1973 puts ;•n obligation on the prosecution to furnish to the 
accused, free of cost, copies of the documents mentioned therein, 
without any delay. It includes, documents or the relevant extracts 
thereof which are forwarded by the police to the Magistrate with 
its report under Section 173(5). Such a compliance has to be made 
on the first date when the accused appears or is brought before 
the Magistrate at the commencement of the trial inasmuch as 
Section 238 warrants the Magistrate to satisfy himself that 
provisions of Section 207 have been complied with. Proviso to 
Section 207 states that if documents are voluminous, instead of 
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TARUN TYAGI v. CENTRAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION 
furnishing the accused with the copy thereof, the Magistrate can 
allow the accused to inspect it either personally or through pleader 
in the Court. [Para 8) [677-C-E) 
1.2 CBI had seized some hard disks marked Q-2, 9 and 20 
from the premises of the appellant which contained the source 
code of the data recovery software. Defence of the appellant is 
that this source code was exclusively prepared by him and was 
his property. On the other hand, case of the prosecution is that 
the recovered CDs are in fact same or similar to the software 
stolen in 2005. In a case like this, at the time of trial, the attempt 
on the part of the prosecution would be to show that the seized. 
material, which contains the source code, is the property of the 
complainant. On the other hand, the appellant would try to 
demonstrate otherwise and his attempt would be to show that 
the source code contained in those CDs is different from the 
source code of the complainant and the seized material contained 
the source code developed by the appellant. It is but obvious 
that in order to prove his defence, the copies of the sei:t.ed CDs 
need to be supplied to the appellant. The right to get these copies 
is statutorily recognised under Section 207, which is the hallmark 
of a fair trail that every document relied upon by the prosecution 
has to be supplied to the defence/accused at the time of supply of 
the chargesheet to enable such an accused to demonstrate that 
no case is made out against him and also to enable him to prepare 
his cross-examination and defence strategy. There is no quarrel 
up to this point even by the prosecution. The only apprehension 
of the prosecution is that if the documents are supplied at this 
stage, the appellant may misuse the same. [Para 10] [678-B-E] 
1.3 The said apprehension of the prosecution is based on the 
opinion of Government Examiner (Expert) who has opined that if 
the cloned copy of the hard disk was required, then the same 
could be prepared by the laboratory on supply of new hard disk 
of 500 GB but such cloned copy could not be write protected. In 
view of the opinion of the Expert, it needs to be ensured that the 
appellant, when given the cloned copy of the hard disk, is not 
able to erase or change or remove the same. If that can be 
._achieved by putting some safegu

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