Smt. Biram Bai Pal Vs State of Chhattisgarh

Smt. Biram Bai Pal W/o Late Shatruhan @ Konda Pal, aged about 42 years, Occupation Labour, R/o Village Nevnara, Police Station Berla, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh.

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... Appellant

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versus

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State Of Chhattisgarh through the Station House Officer, Police Station Berla, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh.

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... Respondent

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For Appellant :- Mr. Vipin Singh, Advocate. For State-Respondent :- Mr. Amit Buxy, Panel Lawyer.

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Division Bench Hon'ble Shri Justice Sanjay K. Agrawal & Hon'ble Shri Justice Sanjay Kumar Jaiswal

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Judgment On Board (03.12.2025)

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Sanjay K. Agrawal, J

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Assail in the present criminal appeal filed under Section 374(2) of the CrPC preferred by the appellant herein, is to the legality, validity and correctness of the judgment dated 30.01.2015 passed by the Sessions Judge, Bemetara, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh,

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in Sessions Trial No.56/2013, by which the appellant herein has been convicted for offence under Section 302 read with Section 34 of the IPC and sentenced thereunder to suffer imprisonment for life with fine of 2,000/-; in default of payment of fine, she has to₹ undergo rigorous imprisonment for one month.

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Prosecution story:-

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The case projected by the prosecution and accepted by the trial Court is that on 08.06.2013 at village Nevnara, Police Station Berla, District Bemetara, Chhattisgarh, the appellant along with her minor son Bhola Pal co-accused, in furtherance of their common intention, murdered her husband Shatruhan @ Konda Pal with the help of wooden stick and thereafter strangulated him by rope and thereby committed the offence. Against the said act of the appellant merg intimation and FIR were registered vide Exs.P/13 & P/11, respectively. Crime details form and spot map were prepared vide Exs.P/12 & P/15, respectively. Inquest proceedings (Ex.P/9 & 20) were conducted and the dead body of the deceased was sent for postmortem. As per postmortem report (Ex.P/18) proved by Dr. G.S. Thakur (PW-11), cause of death was cardio respiratory arrest caused by contercoup contusion on brain as a result of head injury & blow on head and homicidal in nature.

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Wheels of investigation started running and the appellant was arrested. Pursuant to memorandum statement of the appellant (Ex.P/2) her clothes and wooden stick & rope were seized vide Exs. P/5 & P/6, respectively. Other articles were also seized. As per query report (Ex.P/19), suggestion has been given to send the seized articles for chemical analysis, however, FSL report has not been brought on record for the reasons best known to the prosecution.

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After due investigation, appellant herein was charge-sheeted for the aforesaid offence and the case was committed to the Court of Sessions for trial in accordance with law. The appellant / accused abjured her guilt and entered into defence.

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In order to bring home the offence, prosecution has examined as many as 14 witnesses and exhibited 22 documents, whereas, defence, in support of its case, has neither examined any witness nor exhibited any document. The statement of the appellant / accused was recorded under Section 313 of the CrPC in which she denied the circumstances appearing against her in the evidence brought on record by the prosecution, pleaded innocence and false implication.

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The learned trial Court after appreciating the oral and documentary evidence available on record, convicted the appellant / accused for the offence as mentioned in the opening paragraph of the judgment, against which the instant appeal has been preferred by the appellant herein questioning the impugned judgment of conviction and order of sentence.

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Submission of the Parties:-

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Mr. Vipin Singh, learned counsel for the appellant, would submit that the trial Court is absolutely unjustified on convicting appellant for offence in question. He would also submit that the extra-judicial confession which is said to have been made by the appellant before Udayram Sahu (PW-2), Lekhram Sahu (PW-3) & Santosh Sahu (PW-7) is not admissible as the same was made in the public meeting and therefore it is not true and voluntary and on the basis of the extra-judicial confession appellant could not be convicted for the offence in question. He would further submit that the trial Court is absolutely unjustified in invoking Section 106 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 (for short ‘the Evidence Act’) as, as per the statement of Vijay Pal (PW-1) and Udayram Sahu (PW-2) except the appellant and the co-accused her another son Ishwar, aged about 13 years, was also present in the house in

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question at the time of incident, moreover, FSL report has not been brought on record to prove that the seized clothes, wooden stick and rope are stained with the blood or human blood to base her conviction. Therefore, the impugned judgment deserves to be dismissed and the appellant is entitled for acquittal on the basis of benefit of doubt.

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Dr. Amit Buxy, learned State counsel, would oppose the prayer made by learned counsel for the appellant and submit that the trial Court has rightly convicted the appellant for the offence in question relying upon the extra judicial confession and also on the fact that pursuant to memorandum statement of the appellant her clothes and weapons of offence were seized. He would also submit that trial Court has rightly invoked Section 106 of the Evidence Act to base the conviction of the appellant, therefore, the appeal deserves to be dismissed.

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We have heard learned counsel for the parties, considered their rival submission made herein above and gone through the records precisely.

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Discussion & Analysis:-

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The first question, as to whether the death of the deceased was homicidal in nature, has been answered by the trial Court in

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affirmative relying upon the postmortem report (Ex.P/18) proved by Dr. G.S. Thakur (PW-11), which, in our considered opinion, is a correct finding of fact based on evidence available on record and which is neither perverse nor contrary to the record. Accordingly, we hereby affirm the finding of the trial Court holding that the death of the deceased was homicidal in nature.

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Extra-judicial confession:-

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First piece of evidence which has been relied by the trial Court is extra-judicial confession which the appellant is alleged to have given in the public meeting convened in village gram panchayat to Udayram Sahu (PW-2), Lekhram Sahu (PW-3) and Santosh Sahu (PW-7). A careful perusal of statement of PW-2 would show that in a public meeting convened in village gram panchayat, on being asked, the appellant is said to have made extra-judicial confession that she murdered her husband. Similarly, PW-3 & PW-7 have stated in their Court’s statements that in the public meeting convened in the village gram panchayat, the appellant had admitted that she killed her husband. However, i t appears from the statements of the witnesses to the extra-judicial confession that the extra-judicial confession is not true and voluntary. Even otherwise , going by the natural course of human

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conduct, normally, a person would confide about a crime committed by him only with such a person in whom he has implicit faith. Normally, a person would not make a confession about his guilt to someone who is totally a stranger to him or in the public meeting. Furthermore, it is the settled principle of criminal jurisprudence that extra judicial confession is a weak piece of evidence. Wherever the Court, upon due appreciation of the entire prosecution evidence, intends to base a conviction on an extra judicial confession, it must ensure that the same inspires confidence and is corroborated by other prosecution evidence. If, however, the extra judicial confession suffers from material discrepancies or inherent improbabilities and does not appear to be cogent as per the prosecution version, it may be difficult for the Court to base a conviction on such a confession. In such circumstances, the Court would be fully justified in ruling such evidence out of consideration. [ See : Sahadevan and another v. State of Tamil Nadu 1 ]. As such, the extra-judicial confession which is said to have been made by the appellant to PW-2 , PW-3 & PW-7 is not true and voluntary and the same is of no use to the prosecution.

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1 (2012) 6 SCC 403

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Further, to base the conviction of the appellant the trial Court has applied Section 106 of the Evidence Act as the appellant in her statement recorded under Section 313 of the CrPC could not explain as to how and under what circumstances her husband died. However, a careful perusal of statements of Vijay Pal (PW1) and Udayram Sahu (PW-2) would show that on the date and time of offence except the appellant and the co-accused her another son Ishwar was also present in the house in question, therefore, it cannot be said that the said incident was within the special knowledge of the appellant and the co-accused only. Moreover, in light of decision of the Supreme Court in the matter of Nagendra Sah v. State of Bihar 2 in which their Lordships have clearly held that the fact that other members of the family were present would show that there could be another hypothesis which cannot be altogether excluded and observed as under:-

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“19. In this case, as mentioned above, neither the prosecution witnesses have deposed to that effect nor any other material has been placed on record to show that the relationship between the appellant and the deceased was strained in any manner. Moreover, the appellant was not the only person residing in the house where the incident took place and it is brought on record that the parents of the appellant were also present on the date of the incident in the house. The fact that other members of the family of the appellant were present shows that there could be another hypothesis which cannot be altogether excluded.

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2 (2021) 10 SCC 725

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Therefore, it can be said that the facts established do not rule out the existence of any other hypothesis. The facts established cannot be said to be consistent only with one hypothesis of the guilt of the appellant.

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Thus, Section 106 of the Evidence Act will apply to those cases where the prosecution has succeeded in establishing the facts from which a reasonable inference can be drawn regarding the existence of certain other facts which are within the special knowledge of the accused. When the accused fails to offer proper explanation about the existence of said other facts, the court can always draw an appropriate inference.

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23. When a case is resting on circumstantial evidence, if the accused fails to offer a reasonable explanation in discharge of burden placed on him by virtue of Section 106 of the Evidence Act, such a failure may provide an additional link to the chain of circumstances. In a case governed by circumstantial evidence, if the chain of circumstances which is required to be established by the prosecution is not established, the failure of the accused to discharge the burden under Section 106 of the Evidence Act is not relevant at all. When the chain is not complete, falsity of the defence is no ground to convict the accused.”

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Coming to the facts of the present case, in light of principle of law laid down by their Lordships of the Supreme Court in the matter of Nagendra Sah (supra), the trial Court has wrongly applied Section 106 of the Evidence Act to base the conviction of the appellant. As such, we hereby dismiss the finding recorded by the trial Court with regard to Section 106 of the Evidence Act.

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In shape of corroboration, the trial Court has relied upon the fact

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that pursuant to memorandum statement of the appellant her clothes, wooden stick and rope were seized. However, the said seized articles were not subjected to chemical analysis and, therefore, it could not said that the above seized weapons of offences were used in the commission of crime in absence of FSL report. As such, seizure of weapon of offence pursuant to memorandum statement of the appellant, in absence of FSL report or other corroborative piece of evidence, is of no use to the prosecution and the appellant could not be convicted merely on the basis of seizure that too for offence under Section 302 of the IPC. Therefore, the appellant is entitled for acquittal on the basis of principle of benefit of doubt.

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Conclusion:-

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In view of the aforesaid discussion and analysis, the appeal is allowed and the impugned judgment of conviction and order of sentence dated 30.01.2015 passed by the trial Court convicting and sentencing the appellant for the offence in question, is hereby set aside and the appellant is entitled for acquittal on the basis of principle of benefit of doubt as the prosecution has also failed to complete the chain of circumstances in light of decision of the Supreme Court in the matter of Sharad Birdhichand Sarda v.

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State of Maharashtra 3 . Appellant is stated to be on bail. She need

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not surrender. However, her bail bond shall remain in operation for a period of six months as per provisions contained in Section 437-A of the CrPC.

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