Dismissed

Madapa Papaiah, v. The State of A.P.

Telangana HC3 Jul 2012CRLA/983/2008

Case brief

AI extract

What is this about?

This criminal appeal against a life imprisonment conviction for murder was dismissed. The High Court upheld the Sessions Court's finding that the prosecution proved beyond reasonable doubt that the accused hacked the deceased to death with an axe, dismissing contentions regarding witness discrepancies and FIR delay. Conviction and sentence confirmed.

What the court decided

AI extract

Madapa Papaiah, Vs The State of A.P. — Murder and Culpable Homicide | Telangana HC (2012)

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THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE N.V.RAMANA AND

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THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE P. DURGA PRASAD

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CRIMINAL APPEAL No.983 of 2008

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JUDGMENT: (per the Hon’ble Sri Justice P.Durga Prasad)

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This appeal is directed against the conviction and sentence passed in S.C.No.590 of 2007 by the Sessions Judge, Karimnagar on 27.03.2008.

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The appellant is the sole accused and he was prosecuted for the offence under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (for short “IPC”).

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According to the prosecution, the complainant PW.1 is resident of Lenkalagadda village of Mahadevpur Mandal and eking out his livelihood by doing agriculture. He is having five acres of land near Godavari river. His relative Madapa Papaiah i.e. the accused is also having five acres of land near his land. Between their lands, there is a stream. Twenty days prior to the incident, the accused started plucking out white millet crop of complainant and feeding his bullocks. His father, the deceased Madapa Pochaiah, who was watching the field, questioned the accused about spoiling his millet crop and a quarrel arose in between them, due to which the accused bore grudge against the father of the complainant. On 07.02.2007 at 1200 hours PW.1 and his wife PW.2 went to the said field to provide meal to his father, who was in the field and handed over the meal to him and they went outside the stream and while they were harvesting the green gram crop, his father had the meal and has smoking cigar by sitting on the edge of the millet crop. The accused came from behind with an axe and hacked his father on the backside of the head and the same was witnessed by PWs.1 and 2. His father raised hue and cry and fell down on the sand in vorre and died. After that PWs.3 and 4, who are working in the nearby fields, witnessed the occurrence. On the complaint lodged by PW.1, PW.11 has registered the case in Cr.No.8 of 2007 under

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Section 302 of IPC and issued the FIR and took up the investigation. Thereafter, PW.12 took up the investigation and verified the investigation done by PW.11 and held inquest over the dead body of the deceased and sent the dead body for post mortem examination and conducted the scene of offence panchanama and the doctor, PW.10, who conducted autopsy over the dead body of the deceased, opined that the deceased died due to multiple injuries with sharp instrument, shock and hemorrhage leading to death of the deceased. After completing the investigation, PW.12 filed the charge sheet against the accused.

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The Sessions Judge has framed the charge under Section 302 of IPC against the accused and the accused pleaded not guilty for the said charge.

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The prosecution in order to establish the said charge examined P.Ws.1 to 12 and got marked Exs.P-1 to P-19 and MOs.1 to 5. No oral evidence was adduced on behalf of the accused but Exs.D-1 and D-2 were marked in defence.

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Taking into consideration of said oral and documentary evidence, the Sessions Judge found the accused guilty for the charge under Section 302 of IPC and convicted and sentenced him to suffer imprisonment for life and to pay a fine of Rs.100/-.

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Aggrieved by the said conviction and sentence, the present appeal is filed.

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Now the point that arises for consideration is whether the prosecution could able to establish the charge under Section 302 of IPC against the accused beyond reasonable doubt?

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POINT:

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The appellant’s counsel has pleaded that there is a discrepancy with regard to the time of occurrence of the incident in the evidence of PWs.1 and 2 and there is no possibility of their witnessing the incident as they are

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working in the land, which is beyond the vorre and PWs.3 and 4 have not witnessed the incident and they only come to the spot after the occurrence of the incident and thus, the trial Court has committed an error in holding the accused guilty for the charge.

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The Additional Public Prosecutor, on the other hand, has pleaded that PWs.1 and 2 are the eye witnesses to the incident and PWs.3 and 4 have seen the accused going away with an axe and supported the evidence of PWs.1 and 2 and the weapon used in the commission of the offence was also recovered at the instance of the accused as per his confessional statement in the presence of PW.9 and thus, the prosecution could able to establish the charge and rightly convicted the accused.

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According to the prosecution, 25 days prior to the incident, the accused was plucking the white millet crop of the complainant and feeding his bullocks for which the deceased objected and in that regard a quarrel took place between them and thereafter on 07.02.2007 when the deceased was sitting near the millet crop after having lunch and smoking cigar, the accused came from behind and hacked him with an axe on the back side of the head and he fell down and died on the spot.

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PW.1 is the son of the deceased and even though he did not state anything about the previous incident prior to this incident in the chief examination, in the cross-examination, it was elicited by the defence counsel that in his report he mentioned that ten days prior to the incident, the accused removed choppa from their field. With regard to the occurrence of the present incident, PW.1 has stated that on 07.02.2007 himself and his wife PW.2, went to the field by taking food for his father after 9.00 a.m. and about 12.00 noon his father had his lunch and sitting on the bund of their field and smoking a cigar and himself and his wife were attending to the work in the green gram crop at a little distance. At that time the accused all of a sudden came from behind his father and axed with an axe on the head and on the chest and thereby his father fell down. On seeing the incident, himself and his wife raised cries and on hearing

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their cries, PWs.3, 4 and another came to the spot and saw their father dead. On the next day morning at about 10.00 or 11.00 a.m. he went to Mahadevpur police station and presented the report and in the crossexamination also he has stated that he himself scribed the complaint Ex.P1.

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PW.2, who is the wife of PW.1, has also supported about their taking lunch to her father-in-law, on that day at about 9.30 a.m. and by 12.00 noon when herself and PW.1 were attending the green gram crop, her father-in-law was sitting on the bund in the millet crop and smoking a cigar. At that time the accused came with an axe and hit on the head and chest of her father-in-law and on seeing the same herself and PW.1 rushed to the scene and the accused fled away. On hearing their shouts, PWs.3 and 4, who are working in the nearby fields, rushed to the spot and her father-in-law died on the spot, and there is nothing in the crossexamination of PWs.1 and 2 to disbelieve their evidence.

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PW.3 has also stated that on the date of incident himself and his son Palli Chinnaiah were attending to their work in their green gram field, he saw the accused running away from a distance of 150 yards and holding an axe in his hand. He heard PWs.1 and 2 shouting. In the crossexamination, even though he has stated that himself and his son Chinnaiah and Hussain Bee went to Godavari river but subsequently he has stated that they are in the field and they came to know the death of Pochaiah and on hearing the shoutings of PWs.1 and 2 they came to know about the death when they were attending the work in the fields of his brother-in-law Paila Chandraiah.

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PW.4, Shaik Hussain Bee, has also stated that about 10 months back at about noon time the deceased after finishing lunch was sitting on the bund of his land. She was attending to agricultural work in her field. At that time she saw the accused going towards Godavari with an axe keeping on his shoulder and she heard the cries of PWs.1 and 2 and rushed to the place where the deceased was sitting and found him lying on

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the ground with an axe injury on his head and chest and in the crossexamination she has stated that she does not own any land. On hearing the cries of PWs.1 and 2, they went to the spot within half an hour of the incident. Therefore, PWs.3 and 4 have seen the accused going away with an axe while they are coming to the spot and finding the dead body of the deceased with injury on head and chest. The trial Court has scanned the evidence of PWs.1 to 4 and rightly came to the conclusion that the accused has caused the injury to the deceased with an axe on his dead and chest. The doctor, PW.10, who identified the signature of Dr.Sharma, who conducted autopsy over the dead body of the deceased, went to abroad and PW.10 has stated that Ex.P-15 is the post mortem report given by Dr.Sharma and the signature is identified by PW.10 on the said report. As per Ex.P-15 there are three external injuries on the dead body of the deceased viz. 1) left front chest ribs fractured; 2) left part of head; and 3) left hand below elbow joint and the internal injuries are 1) left – lung – damaged; 2) heart damaged and he opined that the cause of death was due to multiple injuries of the sharp instrument – “shock and haemorrhage”, which leads to death of the deceased. Thus, the injuries caused by the accused led to the death of the deceased.

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As per the evidence of PW.12, the investigating officer, the accused was arrested at his house on 22.02.2007 at 3.00 p.m. and in pursuance of his confession Ex.p-14, MO.3 axe was seized and the same was supported by the mediator, PW.9. Thus, the prosecution has established the recovery of the weapon used in the commission of the offence at the instance of the accused.

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The next contention of the appellant’s counsel is that there is a delay of more than 12 hours in lodging the complaint.

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According to the prosecution, the incident has taken place on 07.02.2007 at about 12.00 noon and according to PW.11, he received the complaint Ex.P-1 from PW.1 at about 1.00 p.m. on 08.02.2007 in the police station. As per Ex.P-16, the FIR, the distance between the police station

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and scene of offence is about 20 KMs. The evidence of PW.1 shows that his village Lenkalagadda is not directly connected to Mahadevpur police station. There is Ambatpally village at a distance of 7 KMs from his village, which is in between his village and Mahadevpur. The motor vehicles like jeep and auto will go from Mahadevpur upto Ambatpally only and to reach Ambatpally from his village, they have to go on foot only and it will take about one hour to go to Ambatpally from his village on foot and from Ambatpally to Mahadevpur one can go within 15 or 20 minutes. Even the investigating officer also stated that he went on foot from Mahadevpur to Lenkalagadda. Thus, it is clear that there is no proper transportation from the scene of offence to the police station. Moreover, the trial Court has rightly observed that PW.1 has witnessed a ghastly incident of death of his father in the hands of the accused and he was in depression and as there is no proper transportation facility, he could not immediately lodge a report to the police. Therefore, the trial Court has rightly observed that the delay in lodging the FIR is not fatal to the present case as it is not a faction case to falsely implicate the accused. Therefore, in view of the above discussion, the trial Court has rightly found the accused guilty and convicted and sentenced him for the charge under Section 302 of IPC after analyzing the evidence available on record. Thus, the said finding recorded by the trial Court does not warrant any interference by this Court in this appeal.

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In the result, the Criminal Appeal is dismissed and the conviction and sentence passed in S.C.No.590 of 2007 by the Sessions Judge, Karimnagara on 27.03.2008 for the charge under Section 302 IPC is hereby confirmed.

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__________________ JUSTICE N.V.RAMANA

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______________________ JUSTICE P. DURGA PRASAD

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Date: 03-07-2012 MR

Madapa Papaiah, v. The State of A.P.

Case brief

What is this about?

What the court decided

Madapa Papaiah, v. The State of A.P.

Case brief

What is this about?

What the court decided

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