The Special Judge of the Prevention of Corruption Act, Dr. H.T.C. Lalrinchhana, on Monday, convicted Lalkhomang Guite, the former manager of Aizawl's SBI Mission Veng Branch, and Gary T. Haokip, the proprietor of Sacred Heart Society, for embezzling loans intended for various Self Help Groups (SHGs).
Lalkhomang Guite, a resident of Churachandpur P/A GS Road Gouchin Khup Veng, New Lamka, Manipur, held the position of manager at the State Bank of India, Mission Veng Branch, Aizawl, during the years 2006 and 2007. Gary T. Haokip, a resident of Aizawl's Republic Mual Veng, conspired with Guite in the fraudulent scheme. Both were convicted under Section 120-B read with Sections 420, 468, and 471 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Sections 13(2) read with 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act, 1988, the law applicable at the time of the incident.
The court sentenced Guite and Haokip to four years of imprisonment each, along with a fine of Rs. 10,00,000 (ten lakhs). In the event of non-payment of the fine, an additional imprisonment of two years each will be imposed. The period they have already spent in judicial custody will be deducted from their total sentence, as per Section 428 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).
The court stated that the corrupted amount was huge in terms of currency value at the time of the incident, and thus, inflicting a minimum term of punishment will not deter the crime for the present and future milieu of governance. It also mentioned that the nature of the offence is very peculiar, committed upon numerous victims/SHGs, and shows that both the accused persons are frequently indulged with such type of cheating-related offences upon innocent people.
Furthermore, the judgement mentioned that the convicts openly committed the offence, which denotes that their mindset itself is very corrupt, and that this calls that not only to deter the society but also to deter the offenders for their reformation by inflicting more severe punishment.
For fixing the quantum of fine, quantum of corrupted money is relevant to consider as per section 16 of the PC Act, 1988.