ORDER : A.M. Shaffique, J. This is an application filed by the petitioner/4th accused under Section 389 of Cr.P.C seeking suspension of conviction. It is submitted that there is absolutely no evidence or material against the petitioner to find him guilty. Even the court below had found him guilty only under Sections 167 and 201 of the Indian Penal Code. At the relevant time, when the offence is alleged to have been committed, the petitioner was working as the Principal Sub Inspector of Fort Police Station. At present, he is working as Deputy Superintendent of Police and if the conviction is not suspended, he may be removed from service. 2. The case involves the custodial death of one Udayakumar. Initially the case was tried by the local police and the trial commenced. At the instance of the mother of the deceased Udayakumar, this Court had directed the CBI to conduct investigation, pursuant to which final report had been filed and after trial, the accused in the case had been convicted for separate offences including 302 of the Indian Penal Code and death penalty had been given to accused 1 and 2. 3. As far as the petitioner is concerned, the prosecution allegation was that he was instrumental in correcting the documents namely the First Information Report, remand application, arrest memo, inspection memo, custody memo, GD of Fort Police Station, PSR (Register of Property found in search of Prisoners) and other related documents. Those documents were corrected to indicate the time of arrest of the said Udayakumar. According to the prosecution, all the corrections were made after the death of Udayakumar in order to make it appear that he was arrested much later. The prosecution alleges that the direction to correct the records had been given by accused 4, 5 and 6. The fifth accused is the Circle Inspector of Police who was the Station House Officer and the 6th accused was the Assistant Commissioner of Police. 4. To prove the aforesaid allegation of manipulation/correction of records, prosecution relied upon the oral testimony of approvers who were constables of Fort Police Station during the relevant time who had actually made the corrections in the respective documents. The main approver is PW15, who had stated that they have corrected the documents as instructed by some of the accused including the petitioner. The main approver is PW15, who had stated that they have corrected the documents as instructed by some of the accused including the petitioner. The court below convicted the accused placing reliance upon the evidence of approvers as well as the other circumstances involved in the case. The petitioner/accused is sentenced to undergo imprisonment for three years and to pay a fine of `5000/-. By a separate order, we have already suspended the sentence of the petitioner. 5. In the present petition, the request is for suspending the conviction inter alia contending that there is absolutely no material to corroborate the evidence given by the approvers. Further, it is submitted that the petitioner is working as Dy.S.P and is about to be promoted as the Assistant Commissioner of Police. If the conviction is not stayed, there is every chance that the Government will take action for dismissing him from service. He has no other employment and in the absence of any evidence to implicate him to the offence, the conviction may be stayed is the request. 6. The learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the approvers' evidence requires corroboration and there is absolutely no material to corroborate the said evidence as far as the 4th accused is concerned. PW21 is one witness who makes reference to the presence of the petitioner at the relevant time. PW21 is not an approver and PW21 only deposed that the petitioner had given directions in the manner in which the evidence has to be given before the trial court. However it is pointed out that the said statement is an omission, which amounts to contradiction, as such a statement was not given by PW21 at the time when she gave statement under Section 164 Cr.P.C. before the learned Magistrate. It is therefore contended that there is absolutely no evidence to support the approvers' evidence. The learned counsel for the appellant placed reliance upon the judgments of the Apex Court in Rama Narang v. Ramesh Narang and Others (1995 KHC 1274) and Prithipal Singh and Others v. State of Punjab and Others (2011 KHC 5008) to support his argument that this Court has the power to suspend the conviction as well, taking into consideration the factual aspects involved in this matter. 7. 7. On the other hand, the learned Public Prosecutor appearing for the CBI contended that the learned Sessions Judge had relied upon sufficient material to find the petitioner guilty. The petitioner, being a public servant, if the conviction is stayed, it will give a wrong impression among the public servants, who are involved in similar activities. The learned Public Prosecutor also submitted that, an overall reading of the evidence of PW21 clearly implies that it supports the prosecution case and it gives sufficient corroboration to the evidence of approvers. That apart the court below have found the petitioner guilty based on an appreciation of evidence and at this stage it need not be considered whether the appreciation of evidence is improper or not. The learned Public Prosecutor has placed reliance upon various judgments of the Apex Court in order to contend that while suspending the sentence, the Court will have to be very careful especially with regard to suspending conviction of public servants. The judgments relied upon are: i. State of Maharashtra Through CBI, Anti Corruption Branch, Mumbai v. Balakrishna Dattatrya Kumbhar ( 2012 (12) SCC 384 ) ii. State of Punjab v. Deepak Mattu ( AIR 2008 SC 35 ) iii. State of Punjab v. Navraj Singh ( 2008 (11) SCC 71 ) iv. Sareen v. CBI ( AIR 2001 SC 3320 ) v. Shyam Narain Pandey v. State of U.P ( 2014 (8) SCC 909 ) vi. State of T.N. v. A. Jaganathan ( AIR 1996 SC 2449 ) vii. Central Bureau of Investigation, New Delhi v. M.N. Sharma ( AIR 2009 SC 1185 ) viii. Gopal Reddy V. v State of Telengana (2015 CriLJ 1571) ix. State of Maharashtra v. Gajanan and another ( 2003(12) SCC 432 ) x. Om Prakash v. State of Rajasthan (2008 CriLJ 4285) xi. State of Rajasthan v. Salman Salim Khan ( AIR 2015 SC 2443 ). Substantially these judgments relate to offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. But the argument of the learned Public Prosecutor is that the accused being a public servant, the same principle will apply to the factual situation. 8. This is a case in which the offence alleged against the petitioner are under Sections 167 and 201 of the IPC which have very serious ramifications as far as public servants are concerned. 9. Section 167 reads as follows:- “167. 8. This is a case in which the offence alleged against the petitioner are under Sections 167 and 201 of the IPC which have very serious ramifications as far as public servants are concerned. 9. Section 167 reads as follows:- “167. Public servant framing an incorrect document with intent to cause injury - Whoever, being a public servant, and being, as [such public servant, charged with the preparation or translation of any document or electronic record, frames, prepares or translates that document or electronic record in a manner which he knows or believes to be incorrect, intending thereby to cause or knowing it to be likely that he may thereby cause injury to any person, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years, or with fine, or with both. Section 201 reads as under:- “201. Causing disappearance of evidence of offence, or giving false information to screen offender - Whoever, knowing or having reason to believe that an offence has been committed, causes any evidence of the commission of that offence to disappear, with the intention of screening the offender from legal punishment, or with that intention gives any information respecting the offence which he knows or believes to be false; If a capital offence. - shall, if the offence which he knows or believes to have been committed is punishable with death, be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to seven years, and shall also be liable to fine; If punishable with imprisonment for life. - and if the offence is punishable with imprisonment for life, or with imprisonment which may extend to ten years, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years, and shall also be liable to fine; If punishable with less than ten years’ imprisonment. - and if the offence is punishable with imprisonment for any term not extending to ten years, shall be punished with imprisonment of the description provided for the offence, for a term which may extend to one-fourth part of the longest term of the imprisonment provided for the offence, or with fine, or with both.” S.167 is a penal provision which is directly concerned with a public servant. A public servant is duty bound to ensure that the records are maintained in accordance with the procedure and the rules and regulations in that regard. When such records are corrected knowing fully well that an incorrect entry is being made and knowing fully well that it may cause injury to any person, an offence is made out. Similarly, destroying evidence is also a penal provision as provided u/s 201 irrespective of the fact that the person who indulges in the same is a public servant or not. 10. On an evaluation of the judgments cited by the learned Public Prosecutor, it is rather clear that the Apex court has held that, when charge is levelled against a public servant, the appellate court or revisional court should not suspend the order of conviction during the pendency of the appeal even if the sentence of imprisonment is suspended unless there are exceptional circumstances. It is further held in Sareen's case (supra) that:- “It would be a sublime public policy that the convicted public servant is kept under disability of the conviction in spite of keeping the sentence of imprisonment in abeyance till the disposal of the appeal or revision.” 11. Of course, the apprehension of the accused that he would be dismissed from service on account of the conviction may be well founded. But such removal from service is part of his service conditions. On the other hand, the service rules also stipulate that if he is finally acquitted, he is entitled to get the benefit of reinstatement in service with backwages, unless otherwise held due to such other circumstances involved in the matter. 12. The Apex Court had in a long line of judgments observed that there has to be some exceptional circumstance to suspend the conviction. In this case, other than the fact that the petitioner's service would be terminated by the Government, which according to us is not at all a reason, the other exceptional circumstances pointed out is the lack of evidence. In Balakrishna Dattatrya Kumbhar (supra), the Apex Court after referring to a long line of judgments held that the power to keep in abeyance conviction must be exercised with great circumspection and caution and for the same the applicant must satisfy the Court regarding the evil that is likely to befall on him and for granting such an order, specific reasons are to be given. Similarly in Shyam Narain Pandey (supra), the Apex Court observed that deprivation of source of livelihood cannot be a reason for staying of conviction. The view expressed by the Apex Court had been followed by the Hyderabad High Court in Gopal Reddy (supra) and Rajastan High Court in Om Prakash (supra). 13. On a perusal of the judgment we find that the court below had placed reliance upon the evidence of approvers which is stated to be corroborated by the evidence of PW21. When the court below had relied upon oral evidence and certain circumstances to convict the accused, unless the entire evidence is re-appreciated during final hearing, it may not be possible for us to take a different view. The evaluation of evidence of PW21 who is supposed to have corroborated the evidence of the approvers has to be considered taking into account all other facts and circumstances involved in the matter. What we find from the prosecution allegation and the finding of the Sessions Court is that, it is after the death of Udayakumar that all the documents had been corrected to ensure that it is not a custodial death. A very grave offence had been committed against a citizen, while he was in police custody, as a result of which, his life had been lost, and the records have been manipulated/corrected by responsible officers to ensure that it is not a custodial torture/death. Such instances require to be dealt with very seriously. 14. Public servants have an obligation to the society, that is to serve the citizens. When it comes to Police force, they are deemed to be the guardians to protect the life and property of citizens. When guardians turn perpetrators, the society will perish and it would amount to anarchy. Law of the land affords protection to all the citizens alike irrespective of the divergent socio-economic standards, caste, creed or colour. Even an accused or a convict has his own constitutional protection and the right to be governed by the rule of law. Custodial torture is against all fundamental rights a citizen has and such instances are to be viewed very seriously. 15. While considering similar applications, the Court should also keep in mind the plight of the victim (legal heirs of the deceased) and the impression the society would have, in the event of suspending the conviction. 16. Custodial torture is against all fundamental rights a citizen has and such instances are to be viewed very seriously. 15. While considering similar applications, the Court should also keep in mind the plight of the victim (legal heirs of the deceased) and the impression the society would have, in the event of suspending the conviction. 16. Probably it might be a different situation, if there was no material at all to convict the accused, which may, of course, be treated as an exceptional circumstance. 17. As a Sub Inspector of a Police station, which is a responsible post in Police Service, it was his duty to ensure that the records are properly kept. May be, he would not have involved in making the correction or manipulation of documents, but, at least having known about it, he should have brought it to the notice of the competent authorities. Being a silent spectator for such acts itself have very serious consequences and repercussion to the rule of law and rights of citizens. 18. As far as the judgments relied upon by the learned counsel for the appellant are concerned, Rama Narang's case (supra) relates to suspension of conviction in respect of official of a company and Navjot Singh Sidhu v. State of Punjab [ (2007) 2 SCC 574 ] relates to the suspension of sentence of a sitting Member of Parliament. The sentence was suspended to contest in the election. Though the Court has the power u/s 389 of Cr.P.C to suspend the conviction of an accused, such an order could be passed only in exceptional cases wherein the accused is able to indicate that no material had been relied upon by the Court below for arriving at the guilt of the accused, or as held by the Apex Court in Balakrishna Dattatrya Kumbhar (supra), he should explain the evil that is likely to befall on him. That he would lose his job can never be treated as a reason for staying the conviction. 19. We are concerned about a public servant that too in police service. They are duty bound to ensure public safety and they are supposed to guard the life and property of citizens. As far as the petitioner is concerned the Sessions Court had found him guilty based on certain material. Sufficiency of such material is to be considered at the time of final hearing. They are duty bound to ensure public safety and they are supposed to guard the life and property of citizens. As far as the petitioner is concerned the Sessions Court had found him guilty based on certain material. Sufficiency of such material is to be considered at the time of final hearing. Under such circumstances, we are not inclined to grant the relief sought for and accordingly, the application is dismissed.