Appeal against conviction for murder and impersonation of evidence. High Court acquitted appellants due to lack of admissible evidence regarding homicidal death and reliability of prosecution witnesses.
Appellants acquitted of charges under Sections 302 and 201 of IPC; bail bonds discharged.
This page shows the compact analysis of this judgement. The full analysis — procedural history, issue-by-issue holdings with ratio and obiter, advocates, and paragraph-level evidence for every claim — is being added to the record in batches and will appear here when this judgement has been through it.
HIGH (BOURTOFCHHATTISGARH,BILASPUR
CRA No. 393 of 2003
Both areresidentofVillageAkalwara,O.P.Deok'rr,PoliceStation Saaja,Distt.Durg (CG)
---— Appeliants
In Jail
ghPoliceStation-Saaja,Distt.Durg
---- Respondent
For Appellants : Shri AwadhTripathi, Advocate. For Respondent/State : Shri AdhirajSurana,Govt.Advocate.
Hon'bieShriJusticePritinkerDiwaker
Hon'bleShriJusticeChandraBhushanBaipai
JudgmentOnBoardByJusticePritinkerDiwaker 15/06/201
This appeal arises out of the judgment of conviction and order of Ill AdditionalSessionsJudge sentencedated21.32003passedbythe Bemetara, Distt. Durg, in S.T.No.12212002 convicting (FTC), underSection302andappellantNo.2under a ccused/appellantN 0.1 Section201 of IPC,andsentencingthemtoundergoimprisonmentfor life. pay tine of Rs.50,000/— andsRI for five years, pay fine of
Rs.25,000/- with default stipulationsrespectively.
O2. Brief facts of the case are that on 1.8.2000 a written complaint (Ex.P/15)wasmadebyBhulau, father of the deceased, alleging in it that his son Ramgopal died in suspicious circumstances on 6.7.2000 and thereafter, his last rites have also been performedhurriedlybythe appellants. ln this complaint, he has mentioned that his wife x Rajwantinbai saw the dead body of the deceased lying outside the village in a Kotha'réand afterKSeeing'the‘same,sheinformedhimabout dead body of the deceased, however, as th’eyiwere not in proper senses, the villagers s t rites and within threedays, other last rituals were also ased on this written complaint,merg intimation EXP/17 wa n 26.8.2000 and after mergenquiry, on 10.12.2001 ,FIR ( a s registered against the appellants “ under Section 302/3 of e ompletion of investigation,charge sheet was filed ag a l lants and one Budhman, however, while framing charge,thetrialJudgeframedchargeunderSection302 in the alternative 302/34ofIPCagainstappellantNo.1and201 of IPC against appellantNo.2andco-accusedBudhman.
considering the‘ material available on record, by the impugned judgment convicted and sentenced the accused/appeilants as mentioned in para-1 of this judgment. Co-accused Budhman was also convicted and sentenced under Section 201 of IPC. He preferred a separate criminai appeai against his conviction, however, during pendency of the appeai, he expired and therefore,‘the same was dismissed as abated. The present appeal is in respect of accused Ravishankar and Keju Sinha ;
(i)there is no evid e d to show that deathof the deceased was homicidal in n a‘
(ii)there is inordin ati o ut 25 days on thev‘part of PW—14 Bhulau, father of the d making written complaint. (iii)even in the writte W—14 has not stated that his wife lp Rajwantinbai (PW—1 5 pellants committing murder of the deceased. (iv) there is inordinate delay of about one month in recording diary statement of PW—15 and this appears to be very unnatural because about 50-60 villagers had attended the funeral of the deceased. Had Rajwantinbai seen the appellants committingmurderofthedeceased, .in natural course she would have informed theincidenttothevillagers or the police. In her statement u/s 161 Cr.P.C., PW—15 doesnotsay that she saw the appellants committing murder of the deceasedand merely stated that she saw appellant No.1 fleeing from the place of occurrence and on suspicionshestatedthatashissonwasthreatened by appellant No.1, hemighthavekilledhim.
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(v)theother pieceofevidenceagainsttheaccused/appellants is the statement of PW—16 Katikabai, however, her affidavitwas preparedby a lawyer on 7.12.2001 i.e. after about a year of the incident and thus, based on his statement, the appeiiants cannotbe‘convicted.
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deceased with the first wife of appellant No.1. PW-8 Dinesh Kumar Sharma, is a witness of imaginary inquest EX.P/3. PW—9 Yashpal Gupta, is a lawyer who prepared the affidavits of PW—15 and PW—16. PW—1O A.R. Khan, Asstt. S.l., is the person before whom the said affidavits were given. PW—11 indrabhushan Singh, Sub Inspector, helped in the investigation. PW-12 Dr. Sunil Singh, who medically examined the appellants, has not stated anything specific against the appellants. PW-13 Chanrashekhar Khare, Patwari, prepared the spot map Ex.P/14. PW-14 Bhulau, is father of the deceased, who lodged the written complaint.
«w.
{PC cannot be sustained.
13 In the resuit, the appeal is allowed. The appellants are acquitted of the charges under Section 302 and 201 of IPC. They are reported to be on bail, therefore, their bail bonds stand discharged and they L not surrender. ' ,. .
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Chandra Bhushan Bajpai
fl HJmigeI I I, L :I1 l * Judge ¢— ll
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2 issues framed by the court
Whether there is legally admissible evidence to sustain conviction for murder and destruction of evidence.
Whether the conviction and sentence recorded by the trial Court is sustainable.
2 provisions across 1 enactments
Ravishanker Sinha
Keju Sinha
State
Pritinker Diwaker
Chandra Bhushan Bajpai
As recorded by the court registry
Judgements on the same questions, provisions and authorities, from every court
