Buta Singh vs State of Punjab

Sat Pal, J.

This appeal is directed against the judgment dated 4th October, 1994, passed by the Sessions Judge, Ferozepur. By this judgment, the learned Sessions Judge convicted the appellant under section 302, IPC and sentenced him to undergo imprisonment for life and to pay a fine of Rs. 500/ and in default of payment of fine, further R.I. for six months.

A case under Section 302, IPC was registered at PS Jalalabad on 26.11.1992 her against the appellant Buta Singh for the murder of his son Sant Parkash Singh vide FIR Exhibit PE/2. The case was registered on the basis of the statement Exhibit PE of Rupinder Kaur (PW2) widow of deceased Sant Parkash Singh, recorded in the village Bagge Ke Uttar by ASI Kartar Singh (PW7) on 26.11.1992 at 4 P.M. The recording of the FIR was completed at 5 PM. The distance between the place of occurrence and PS Jalalabad is 4 miles. Special report reached the Ilaqa Magistrate at 6.30 P.M. on 26.11.1992 itself.

In her statement, Exhibit PE, PW2 Rupinder Kaur stated that she was married with deceased Sant Parkash Singh. She further stated that on 25.11.1992 husband returned home in the evening after purchasing jeep and her fatherinlaw Buta Singh (appellant) and her motherinlaw Devinder Kaur were also present in the house and at about 7.30 P.M. her fatherinlaw after having his meals started breaking planks of the door with a Gandasa. On this her husband objected to it and snatched the gandasa from him. Then his fatherinlaw took up an iron rod which was lying there and dealt blows with it on the head, forehead and the left side of the head of her husband, as a result of which her husband fell down and he had sustained one more injury near the left eye. Thereafter she and her motherinlaw raised alarm of "Marta, Marta" (killed, killed). At this, her fatherinlaw stopped causing injuries to her husband. Then they removed her husband to Dr. Sant Parkash Singh of Baba Hospital at Jalalabad who gave first aid and at the same time he advised them to take the injured somewhere else. She further stated that they had hardly taken Sant Parkash Singh out of the Baba Hospital, her husband expired at about 11/12 night. She and her motherinlaw continued waiting for their relatives. She along with her grandfather Sukhchain Singh and Gurcharan Singh Sarpanch was going to the Police Station to lodge the report when ASI Kartar Singh met them. After making the endorsement on the statement, ASI Kartar Singh (PW7) sent the ruqa to the Police Station through Constable Ved Parkash, and on its basis, formal FIR Exhibit PE/2 was registered. Thereafter PW7 ASI Kartar Singh went to the place of occurrence and prepared the inquest report, Exhibit PD. He lifted the bloodstained earth and simple earth from the place of occurrence and took the same into possession vide Memo Exhibit PM. He also prepared the rough site plan Exhibit PN with marginal notes and also recorded the statements of the witnesses. On return to the Police Station, he deposited the case property with MHC Sunder Singh.

PW7 ASI Kartar Singh entrusted the dead body to HC Gurdip Singh for postmortem examination. PW1 Dr. Ajay Kumar conducted the postmortem examination on the dead body of Sant Parkash Singh. He found the following injuries on the dead body :

"1. A stitched wound measuring 5 cm. long obliquely over left side of forehead starting 3 cm. from mid scalp line on left side of hair line.

A stitched wound 5.5. cm. long present on the right parietal area of skull 1 cm. from area of mid scalp line, slightly obliquely in direction.

Upper lid of left eye was swollen and blackish.

On dissection of injury No. 1 hematoma was present. Bone was found to be intact. Underneath bone the meninges and brain matter was found to be congested.

Underneath injury No. 2 hematoma was present. The parietal bone was found to be fractured and was depressing into the brain matter which was found to be lacerated and congested. The base of skull was also found to be fractured. Underneath injury No. 3 subcutaneous tissue was acchymosed."

In the opinion of the doctor, the cause of death was due to shock as a result of injury to the brain which was sufficient to cause death in the ordinary course of nature. He found that all the injuries were ante mortem. He also opined that the possibility of the injuries on the dead body of Sant Parkash Singh could not be ruled out having been caused with rod Exhibit P1.

The appellant was arrested by PW7 on 1.12.1992 and was interrogated by him and during the course of investigation, the appellant suffered disclosure statement Exhibit PQ which was attested by Gurcharan Singh and Darbara Singh. As a result of the said disclosure statement of the appellant, rod Exhibit P1 was recovered from underneath the heap of cotton crop lying in the room of Dhani of the appellant. The rod was taken into possession vide Memo Exhibit PQ/1 and rough site plan of the recovery Exhibit PQ/2 was prepared by PW 7. After completion of the investigation, the accused was challaned.

In support of its case, the prosecution examined 7 witnesses. PW1 Dr. Ajay Kumar, conducted the postmortem examination on the deadbody of Sant Parkash Singh. PW2 Rupinder Kaur who is the wife of the deceased, is the eye witness. PW3 Joginder Kaur who is the mother of the deceased is the other eye witness. PW4 Dr. Sant Parkash Singh provided first aid to the injured. PW5 Sharanjit Singh proved that the deceased had purchased the jeep from him vide receipt Exhibit PJ dated 25.11.1992. PW6 Krishan Lal Patwari prepared the scaled site plan Exhibit PK. PW7 ASI Kartar Singh is the I.O.

In his statement recorded under Section 313, Cr.P.C., the appellant pleaded innocence. His reply to question No. 35 was a follows:

"Sukhchain Singh wants to grab the land and falsely implicates me in this case. Nobody kills his own son. I had already many times earlier got released my son who was involved in criminal hurt cases many times."

On the basis of the prosecution evidence, the appellant was convicted and sentenced, as stated earlier.

Mr. Aulakh, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the appellant, submitted that the motive alleged by the prosecution has not been established. He submitted that PW2 who is the widow of the deceased, in her statement, recorded by the Police, did not say a word about the purchase of the jeep by her husband which allegedly annoyed the appellant. He further submitted that PW5 Sharanjit Singh who allegedly sold the jeep to the deceased had failed to prove that the registration of the jeep was transferred in favour of the deceased.

The learned counsel also submitted that the deceased was a young man of 22 years whereas the accused is about 65/70 years old and it has been proved on record that the deceased had snatched the gandasa from the appellant and it cannot be believed that the appellant thereafter could have inflicted the injuries on his son with an iron rod which was admittedly 25" long. He submitted that PW2 Rupinder Kaur, in her crossexamination, had admitted that the Gandasa was still in the hand of the deceased when the appellant inflicted the injuries with iron rod. He contended that the story put by the prosecution was quite improbable and was not free from doubt. He submitted that in fact the case was registered against the appellant at the behest of Sukhchain Singh.

The learned counsel further submitted that in the postmortem report, the time between injury and death had not been mentioned and it was only at a later stage that the I.O. sought the opinion of Dr. Ajay Kumar (PW1) to fill this lacuna. He further submitted that PW1, in his crossexamination, had admitted that it could not be definitely stated whether the injuries were caused by the sharpedged weapon or blunt weapon. He contended that this creates suspicion in the case of the prosecution.

The learned counsel submitted that there was also delay in lodging the FIR. He submitted that the occurrence happened at 7.30 PM on 25.11.1992 and Sant Parkash Singh expired at Jalalabad in front of a private hospital at about 11/12 night on 25.11.1992 but the statement of Rupinder Kaur (PW2) which formed the basis of the FIR, was recorded on 26.11.1992 at 4 P.M., formal FIR was recorded at 5 P.M. and the special report reached the Ilaqa Magistrate at 6 P.M. on 26.11.1992. He contended that these facts show that there was an unexplained delay in lodging the FIR. He submitted that many relatives of the deceased were living in the village and any one of them could have reported the matter to the Police immediately after his murder.

Mr. Sullar, learned AAG Punjab, submitted that both the eye witnesses PW2 Rupinder Kaur and PW3 Devinder Kaur have supported the case of the prosecution. He submitted that the motive had also been proved in this case as these said two eye witnesses have proved that the appellant became annoyed when he found that his son (deceased) had purchased the jeep against his wishes. He also submitted that the purchase of jeep had been fully proved by PW5 Sharanjit Singh, who had sold the jeep to the deceased.

Learned AAG further submitted that the delay, if any, in lodging the FIR has been fully explained by PW2. He, therefore, contended that there was no merit in this appeal and as such the appeal was liable to be dismissed.

We have given our thoughtful consideration to the submissions made by the learned counsel for the parties and have perused the records. It is not disputed that deceased Sant Parkash Singh was assaulted in his own house at 7.30 P.M. on 25.11.1992. The presence of his wife PW2 Rupinder Kaur and his mother PW3 Devinder Kaur cannot be said to be unnatural. There is no inconsistency in the oral version as given by these two eye witnesses, Rupinder Kaur and Devinder Kaur. Both these witnesses, in their respective evidence, have stated that the deceased had purchased a jeep and brought the same to the house on the day of the occurrence at about 7/7.15 P.M. Both of them have also deposed that the appellant who is the father of the deceased had objected to the purchase of this jeep by the deceased without his permission. Both of them further stated that the appellant after having seen the jeep at his house at 7.30 P.M. started damaging the gate of the house with a Gandasa and after this gandasa was snatched from the appellant by the deceased, the appellant picked up an iron rod lying nearby and with it gave blow on the head of deceased Sant Parkash Singh. Thereafter, he gave another blow with the iron rod on the left side of forehead of the deceased and gave another blow on his left eye, as a result of which he fell down. At this, they raised alarm "Marta, Marta" (Killed, killed) and then the appellant stopped causing further injuries to the deceased. Both PW2 and PW3 then took the injured Sant Parkash to a private hospital where he was given firstaid but the doctor of the private hospital suggested that he should be taken to some other Hospital and as soon as they came out of the clinic of the private hospital, Sant Parkash Singh succumbed to his injuries.

The ocular version as given by the two eyewitnesses PW2 and PW3 completely tallies with the medical evidence as given by Dr. Ajay Kumar. The injuries found by Dr. Ajay Kumar at the time of conducting the postmortem examination on the dead body of Sant Parkash Singh were on the left side of forehead, on the right parietal area of skull and the upper lid of left eye. In the opinion of the doctor, the cause of death was due to shock as a result of injury to the brain which was sufficient to cause death in the ordinary course of nature and all the injuries were antemortem.

On the basis of the evidence of the two eye witnesses PW2 and PW3, whose presence at the spot cannot be doubted and whose ocular version of the facts is fully corroborated by the medical evidence, we are satisfied that the appellant caused multiple injuries on the deceased with the iron rod, Exhibit P1 and deceased Sant Parkash Singh died as a result of those injuries.

As regards the contention of the learned counsel for the appellant that there is a delay in lodging the FIR in this case, there is no doubt that there is some delay in lodging the FIR but if the prosecution explains the delay satisfactorily, the Court is not expected to reject the whole prosecution case merely on that ground. After taking all the facts and circumstances of this case into consideration, the prosecution case cannot be rejected on the ground that the first information report was not lodged immediately after the death of deceased Sant Parkash Singh. In the present case, as stated earlier, deceased Sant Parkash Singh, who was a youngman of 22 years has been murdered by his own father, appellant Buta Singh. The appellant committed murderous assault on the deceased at 7.30 P.M. on 25.11.1992. The wife of Sant Parkash Singh deceased Rupinder Kaur and his mother, Devinder Kaur, took him to a private hospital at Jalalabad which is situated at a distance of 4 miles from the place of occurrence where after getting first aid and while being taken to another hospital, he died at about 11/12 night. Then the dead body was taken by these two ladies to their village. PW2, in her statement has deposed that since she and her motherinlaw were the only members present in the house, they waited for their relations to come and it was only after grandfather of PW2, namely Sukhchain Singh of village Sattianwala came there on 26.11.1992, that she along with her grandfather and Gurcharan Singh Sarpanch of the village left for the Police Station to lodge the report and it was in these circumstances that her statement, Exhibit PE was recorded by ASI Kartar Singh at 4 P.M. on 26.11.1992. Thereafter formal FIR was recorded at 5 PM and special report reached the Ilaqa Magistrate at 6.30 P.M. on the same day. The agony of PW2 Rupinder Kaur, who is the wife of the deceased and of Devinder Kaur, who is the mother of the deceased at their home in the absence of any male member can be well appreciated. Taking all these facts and circumstances into consideration, we are of the opinion that the prosecution has explained the delay satisfactorily. The view we have taken finds support from a judgment of the Supreme Court in the case of State of Haryana v. Manoj Kumar, AIR 1994 SC 147.

As regards the contention of the learned counsel for the appellant that the trial of the case is vitiated as the time between injury and death was not mentioned in the post mortem report, we do not find any substance in this contention. It is true that PW1 Ajay Kumar had omitted to mention the time between the injury and death of the deceased but when this omission was pointed out to PW1 by the Investigating Officer (PW7) by his letter dated 8th February, 1993, Exhibit PD, Dr. Ajay Kumar on the same day vide his endorsement Exhibit PD/1 replied that the time elapsed between the injuries and death was between few minutes to few hours. This omission on the part of the doctor cannot be fatal to the case of the prosecution particularly when the evidence of the two eyewitnesses PW2 and PW3 is otherwise fully corroborated by the medical evidence.

We do not find any merit also in the contention of the learned counsel for the appellant that the present case was registered against the appellant at the behest of Sukhchain Singh, who is the grandfather of the widow of the deceased. We fail to understand as to why PW3 Devinder Kaur would have implicated her husband falsely for the murder of his own son. Accordingly, this contention of the appellant is also rejected. As regards the contention of the learned counsel for the appellant that the motive urged by the prosecution has not been established, we are of the opinion that the question of motive in the present case pales into insignificance as we have come to the conclusion that there is positive and cogent evidence against the appellant for the murder of his son Sant Parkash Singh. Since the appellant has caused three injuries, one after the other on the vital parts of the body of deceased with an iron rod, the present case is fully covered under Section 302, Indian Penal Code.

For the reasons recorded herein above, the appeal fails, and is accordingly dismissed.