NEW DELHI: More than 20 years after two men were booked for possessing allegedly forged passports, visa stickers and rubber stamps of the Saudi Arabian embassy, a court here has given them the benefit of doubt and acquitted them of fraudulently using the documents.
Metropolitan Magistrate Ajeet Narayan was hearing a case registered against Suleman Khan and Hasibul Rehman. The Farsh Bazar police station registered an FIR against the pair in 2002.
According to the prosecution, six fake passports, three visa stickers, and five rubber stamps purported to be of the Embassy of Saudi Arabia were recovered from Khan on August 13, 2002. Rehman was Khan's accomplice and induced the victims, it said.
"I am of the considered view that the prosecution has failed to prove its case against the accused beyond a reasonable doubt, whereby both the accused have become entitled to the benefit of the doubt," the magistrate said in a recent judgment.
"Accordingly, the accused are hereby acquitted for the offences" he added.
The court said the prosecution was unable to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the visa stickers and the stamps were forged, that they had been recovered from the accused and that the accused intended to use those as genuine.