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Home › Criminal Revision: ATM Fraud
Calcutta High Court · 12 November 2026

When Every Link Breaks: Concurrent ATM-Fraud Convictions Overturned in Revision

Revisional courts rarely reappreciate evidence — but findings resting on no admissible evidence are perverse: recoveries that were legally non est, electronic records without certificates, a tainted identification and a parity violation.

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In Dilwar Hossain & Anr. v. State of West Bengal & Anr. (C.R.R. No. 1781 of 2022, pronounced 12 November 2026), Justice Uday Kumar of the Calcutta High Court set aside concurrent convictions under Sections 419, 420 and 120B IPC in an ATM card-swap fraud that had siphoned Rs 65,300 from a complainant’s debit card. The judgment is a systematic demonstration of how a prosecution assembled without evidentiary discipline collapses — and of the narrow but real power of a revisional court to say so.

The case in one view

CaseDilwar Hossain & Anr. v. State of West Bengal & Anr., C.R.R. No. 1781 of 2022
CourtHigh Court at Calcutta, Criminal Revisional Jurisdiction — Justice Uday Kumar
Pronounced12 November 2026 (reserved 13 October 2026)
BelowConvictions under Sections 419/420/120B IPC (Cyber Crime P.S. Case No. 05 of 2019, Malda), affirmed by the 5th Additional Sessions Judge, Malda in Criminal Appeal No. 04 of 2021
OutcomeRevision allowed; convictions set aside; acquittal on benefit of doubt; fines to be refunded

A card swap, a conviction, and its foundations

The prosecution alleged the classic ATM-kiosk deception: the complainant’s debit card swapped in a moment of engineered confusion, followed by withdrawals totalling Rs 65,300. Two courts convicted. The revision succeeded because, examined link by link, the chain had never been forged in admissible form.

Five failures, catalogued

1. Recoveries legally non est. No Malkhana register was produced; the seizures were unsealed; the seizure box was manufactured a month after the recorded seizure date; and only 9 of the 26 ATM cards allegedly seized were produced in court. Recoveries so documented prove nothing.
2. Electronic records without certificates. The bank printout, tax invoice and merchant slip came without Section 65B Evidence Act and Bankers’ Books Evidence Act certificates. Applying Anvar P.V. v. P.K. Basheer, they were inadmissible — and exhibit-marking at trial cured nothing.
3. A tainted TIP. The accused were shown to the complainant at the police station before the parade, and the Magistrate’s own testimony contradicted the TIP record. Identification evidence of that kind carries no weight.
4. Parity violated. The trial court acquitted a co-accused by disbelieving the recovery evidence — then convicted the petitioners on the identical material. Article 14 does not permit the same evidence to be true for one accused and false for another, as Javed Shaukat Ali Qureshi holds.
5. Antecedents as proof. Criminal antecedents were used as substantive evidence of guilt, impermissibly shifting the burden onto the accused.

The revisional threshold, honestly applied

The judgment is candid about the jurisdictional tension. Revision is supervisory; concurrent findings of fact ordinarily end the matter. But the supervisory power exists precisely for the case where the findings rest on no admissible evidence — where what the courts below called appreciation was in truth assumption. Citing the line that includes Sujit Biswas and Sanjaysinh Ramrao Chavan, the Court located perversity not in a different view of credible evidence, but in the absence of legally cognisable evidence to view at all.

Lessons for cyber-fraud litigation

For investigators. Digital-finance prosecutions live and die on custody discipline: sealed seizures, contemporaneous registers, and certificates under Section 65B — now Section 63 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam — obtained when the records are extracted, not at trial.
For defence counsel. Audit the exhibit list against the certificates before cross-examination begins; an admissibility objection preserved on the record is worth more than any amount of credibility attack later.
For appellate strategy. Where both courts below convicted, frame the challenge as absence of admissible evidence, not as a plea to re-weigh — the former opens the revisional door that the latter keeps shut.
For parity arguments. Map each co-accused’s treatment against the evidence relied on; an acquittal next door on identical material is among the strongest revisional grounds available.
The acquittal was on benefit of doubt, with fines ordered refunded. The decision does not hold that no fraud occurred — it holds that the State never proved one by legal means. The distinction is the entire discipline of criminal evidence.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can a revisional court reappreciate evidence?

Ordinarily no — revision under Sections 397/401 CrPC (now Sections 438/442 BNSS) corrects jurisdictional errors and perversity, not factual disagreement. But the Court held that findings resting on no admissible evidence at all are perverse, which brings them within revisional reach.

Why were the bank records inadmissible?

The bank printout, tax invoice and merchant slip were produced without certificates under Section 65B of the Evidence Act and the Bankers' Books Evidence Act. Following Anvar P.V. v. P.K. Basheer, electronic records are inadmissible without the certificate, and merely marking them as exhibits cures nothing.

What vitiated the identification?

The accused were shown to the complainant at the police station before the test identification parade, and the Magistrate's testimony contradicted the TIP record. An identification preceded by exposure of the accused loses its evidentiary value.

What was the parity violation?

The trial court disbelieved identical recovery evidence to acquit a co-accused while convicting the petitioners on the very same material. Treating identical evidence differently for identically placed accused violates Article 14 — the principle applied in Javed Shaukat Ali Qureshi.

Sources

Note: This article is general information about the law and is not legal advice. It does not create an advocate-client relationship. The position stated is as at 13 November 2026 and may have changed since. Readers should verify any provision or decision referred to against the official text and seek advice on their own circumstances.