H.C. Punjab quashed application against acquittal in a violent land dispute case involving armed entry and attempted murder. High Court upheld trial court's decision due to FIR delay, lack of injuries, site plan discrepancies, and forensic mismatches.
Application under Section 378(4) Cr.P.C. dismissed; Special leave to appeal declined.
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.
CRM-A-1476-MA-2015
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IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH
CRM-A-1476-MA-2015
Date of decision: 19.01.2016
Harpreet Kaur
..... Applicant
Versus
State of Punjab and others
..... Respondents
CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE T.P.S. MANN HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RAMENDRA JAIN
1. Whether Reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the judgment?
2. To be referred to the Reporters or not?
3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest?
PRESENT: Ms. GK Mann, Advocate for the applicant.
RAMENDRA JAIN, J.
Applicant-complainant by way of present application filed under Section 378 (4) Cr.P.C. has sought permission to file the accompanying appeal against acquittal of respondents No. 2 to 4 vide judgment dated 21.05.2015, passed by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Amritsar.
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room. They found Jagjit Singh, entering their house by scaling the wall and opened the main gate. Respondent No. 2-Swaran Singh @ Sona armed with .12 bore rifle along with respondent No. 3-Amarjit Kaur and 5-6 unknown assailants forcibly entered the house of applicantcomplainant. On raising lalkara by respondent No. 3 to teach a lesson to the husband of applicant-complainant for taking possession of the land, respondent No. 2 fired shot from his rifle towards Kanwaljit Singh with an intention to kill him. Co-accused Jagjit Singh @ Jita, caught the applicant-complainant from her plait and threw her on the ground and dragged her. Jagjit Singh, also snatched the gold chain weighing two tolas from the neck of the applicant-complainant. Her raising alarm attracted her sister-in-law Jaswant Kaur on the spot. Thereafter, all the accused ran away with their respective weapons. Due to fear, husband of the applicant-complainant also ran away from the house.
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Offender) have entered their house and respondent No. 2 fired a shot upon her husband. Co-accused Jagjit Singh @ Jita by catching hold her plait threw her on the ground and dragged her. He also snatched a gold chain weighing two tolas from her neck. On their raising alarm, her sister-in-law Jaswant Kaur, came at the spot. Thereafter, all the accused ran away from the spot.
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deposed about the chain of investigation conducted by him.
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submissions made by learned counsel for the applicant-complainant and find that the present application is completely devoid of any merit for the reasons to follow:-
(i) As per prosecution story, the occurrence took place at about 10.45 P.M. on 14.03.2007. However, the FIR was lodged at 4.30 P.M. on the next day on 15.03.2007 i.e. after 18 hours (approximately). There is no explanation on record that why the FIR was not promptly lodged, more particularly, when nobody from the complainant side suffered any injury in the occurrence. As per applicant-complainant, firing was also done by the accused person in her house. In such a panic situation any person of ordinary prudence would try to approach the police without any delay. The applicant-complainant in her cross-examination has categorically admitted that during the night of occurrence, they did not inform the police. Even they did not make any call to police. In the next morning, they went to the Court to attend their case without giving any information of occurrence to the police. PW-3 Jaswant Kaur, sister-in-law of the applicantcomplainant had also admitted this fact. Even the complainant party did not inform the Panchayat about the alleged occurrence. The above conduct of the complainant party is highly doubtful. The learned trial
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Court has, thus, rightly observed that the prosecution story was not natural rather was completely doubtful. (ii) The occurrence took place around 10.45 P.M. In ordinary course, by that time nobody goes to sleep. Even otherwise by hearing the sound of firing many villagers might have gathered at the spot, but no co-villager or any independent witness was joined in the investigation. Even the complainant party did not ask any of the co-villager or neighbourer to report the matter to the police. The above all factors create suspicion about the prosecution story and, thus, we are of the considered opinion that respondents No. 2 to 4 have rightly been acquitted by the learned trial Court. (iii) As per the applicant-complainant, the occurrence took place in her house. Jagjit Sing @ Jita (Proclaimed Offender) by scaling the wall of the house of applicant-complainant entered into her house and then opened the main gate. Thereafter, respondents No. 2 to 4 have entered in the house. Firing was done by respondent No. 2. However, the Investigating Officer/ASI Tarlochan Singh (PW-7), did not find any empty cartridge lying there. Rather PW-7 ASI Tarlochan Singh stated that the three points A, B, and C from where he lifted the empties from the spot were located in the street outside the house of the
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complainant. Rough site plan of the place of occurrence was correctly prepared by him. The above deposition of PW-7 ASI Tarlochan Singh, clarifies that the alleged occurrence did not take place in the house of the applicant-complainant rather, if any, took place in the street outside her house. The above discrepancy in the statement of applicant-complainant and PW-7 ASI Tarlochan Singh proves that the things did not happen in the manner as narrated by the prosecution. There were improvements and deliberations in the applicant-complainant's version before the police and her deposition in the Court.
(iv) The learned trial Court has rightly observed that no corresponding injury was found on the person of applicant-complainant when her gold chain was forcibly taken away by Jagjit Singh. In these circumstances, the prosecution story renders doubtful, more particularly, when recovery of gold chain was not effected from any of the respondents.
(v) As per FSL report Ex. PX, none of the empties recovered from the spot were found fired from the recovered DBBL Gun which also renders the prosecution story doubtful. Contrary to it, the defence plea taken by respondents No. 2 to 4 seems to be quite genuine and probable that there was a land dispute
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between Kanwaljit Singh, husband of the applicantcomplainant with respondent No. 3 and for that reason they were falsely implicated in the instant case. Respondent No. 3 in her defence had tendered the certified copies of complaint and judgments Ex. DB to Ex. DJ, in support of her above assertion, therefore, possibility of false implication cannot be ruled out. There was no independent corroboration to the statements of applicant-complainant, her husband and sister-in-law which is fatal to the prosecution case.
( T.P.S. MANN ) ( RAMENDRA JAIN ) JUDGE JUDGE
January 19, 2016
rishu
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3 issues framed by the court
Whether the High Court should admit a Section 378(4) Cr.P.C. application for filing an appeal against the trial court's acquittal due to a disputed land matter.
Whether the delay of 18 hours in lodging the FIR and the absence of injury on the accused despite an alleged gunshot wound supports doubt in the prosecution case.
Whether the failure to recover the stolen gold chain and the forensic report not linking shell casings to the recovered gun negates prosecution evidence.
3 provisions across 3 enactments
Harpreet Kaur
State of Punjab
T.P.S. Mann
Ramendra Jain
As recorded by the court registry
Judgements on the same questions, provisions and authorities, from every court
