Prema Ram @ Premsukh S/o Shri Ramjiram vs Union of India

These three appeals have been preferred on behalf of the

appellants under Section 14A(2) of the SC/ST (Prevention of

Atrocities) Amendment Act 2015 being aggrieved of rejection of

their bail applications by the learned Special Judge, SC/ST

(Prevention of Atrocity) Cases, Merta (vide order dated

27.02.2017 in Cr.Misc. Case No.106/2017 qua accused Prema

Ram), (order dated 25.11.2016 in Cr.Misc. Case No.255/2016 qua

accused Pancha Ram) and (order dated 17.04.2017 in Cr.Misc.

Case No.182/2017 qua accused Ravindra), who are in custody in

connection with FIR No.168/2015, registered at Police Station

Merta City, District Nagaur for the offences under Section 34, 324,

325, 326, 354, 436, 147, 148, 149, 302, 307 and 323 IPC and

Sections 3(1) (v)(x) and 3(2)(v) of the SC/ST (Prevention of

Atrocities) Act.

The prosecution pertains to an incident dated 14.05.2015

which occurred at the village Dangawas, District Nagaur in which,

5 persons were killed and 11 persons were injured in a case of

mass violence.

Sarva Shri J.S. Choudhary and Shri HSS Kharlia, learned Sr.

Counsel assisted by their associates Shri Amardeep Lamba and

Shri Dinesh Lol respectively, and Shri Farzand Ali, counsel

representing the respective appellants vehemently urged that the

land in question was in cultivatory possession of the accused party since decades. The complainant party, took illegal possession

thereof a few days before the incident. A panchayat was held in

the village and the complainants were advised not to interfere in

the cultivatory possession of the accused party but they did not

desist from their offending act on the fateful day. A panchayat of

all the community members was convened to for available

settlement of the land dispute between the parties. The members

of the complainant party sent Rampal Puri and Ramdeo Khadav to

call Ratna Ram to the village to join the panchayat for resolving

the dispute. However, when Rampal Puri and Ramdeo Khadav

entered the disputed field, the accused persons, who were lying in

wait, launched an assault and started firing gunshot at them

without any provocation. Rampal Puri died on spot whereas

Ramdeo Khadav received gunshot injuries. On hearing the

gunshots, the villagers rushed to the scene of occurrence and in

the unintentional melee which followed, five members of the

complainant party died and some were injured. Some persons

from the accused side also received injuries. They urged that

looking to the manner in which the incident happened and the

genesis of the occurrence, it becomes essential for the prosecution

to assign specific role to each of the accused for fixing

responsibility in the incident because Section 149 IPC would have

no applicability looking to the peculiar facts of the case.

Shri Kharlia, in addition to the above submissions, contended

that the appellant Ravindra has been falsely implicated in this

case. He is a government servant and was not present at the

scene of occurrence on the day of incident. His attendance

certificate was referred to and it was urged that the name of

appellant Ravindra is not mentioned in the Parcha Bayan of Arjun

Ram at Government Hospital, Merta City on the basis whereof, the

FIR was lodged. He further contended that even in the belated

statements of some witnesses, one son of Dharu Ram Jajra is

implicated as an assailant but, merely because of that, the

appellant''s participation in the incident would not be established

because Dharu Ram Jajra has two sons and this cannot be stated

with any certainty that the appellant was present during the

assault in the case at hand. He further submitted that the

appellant Ravindra Kumar''s name was introduced in the third

round of investigation without any justification and in order to

wreak vengeance and thus, he deserves indulgence of bail.

Per contra, Dr. Sachin Acharya, learned Special Public

Prosecutor representing the CBI and Shri Vishal Sharma

representing the complainant, vehemently opposed the

submissions advanced by the learned counsel representing the

appellants'' and craved rejection of these bail appeals. They

submitted that it is a case of gruesome pre-planned attack on the

members of a weaker section of society which culminated into

death of five innocent persons and grave life threatening injuries

to eleven persons from the complainant side including ladies. The

accused persons formed an unlawful assembly and

indiscriminately assaulted the members of complainant party who

were admittedly in possession of the field in question from some

time before the incident. The accused party was bent upon to

dispossess the complainant party from the agricultural field which

stood in their name in the revenue record. With this purpose in

mind, they pursued their common intention of eliminating the

complainant party who belongs to Scheduled Caste and

mercilessly assaulted all the persons present in the field including

ladies. The brutality of the assault was so immense that everyone

who came in the way was pursued and attacked. Five persons died

on spot whereas, 11 persons, including ladies, received grave

injuries by vehicular collision, blunt and sharp weapons, etc.

Bodies of the deceased were mutilated beyond recognition by

frequent running over by tractors, etc. They urged that the

manner in which the incident occurred, clearly attracts application

of Section 149 IPC against all those who were present at the

scene of occurrence irrespective of the role assigned to them. So

far as the appellant Ravindra Kumar is concerned, they urged that

his presence at the scene of occurrence is specificially mentioned

in the statement of witness Kishna Ram recorded by the CBI. Not

only this, the appellant Ravindra was implicated in the first

statement dated 18.05.2015 of the witness Khema Ram recorded

just after the incident as son of Dharu Ram Jajra. They thus urged

that the appellants do not deserve to be released on bail.

I have given my thoughtful consideration to the submissions

advanced by the learned counsel for the parties and have gone

through the material available on the record.

The case at hand is clearly one of extremely grave and brutal

violence. The complainant party was apparently peeved by their

failure to re-possess the agricultural field which admittedly stands

in the name of the accused party in the revenue record. They

decided to take law into their own hands for settling the scores

and for this end, all the assailants formed a mob of about 300

people, armed themselves tooth and nail and launched an

indiscriminate all out assault on members of the complainant

party. The attack was so severe that women as well as old persons

from the complainant side were attacked and beaten mercilessly.

Five people died in the incident whereas 11 persons received

serious injuries.

In this background, it would be totally impossible to believe

and expect that the complainant Arjun Ram or any other witness

would be in any position to give out graphic details of the incident

by naming each accused and assigning specific role to them. The

site of inspection prepared by the I.O. shows that numerous

members of the complainant party were beaten at different

locations in a huge agricultural field and thus apparently, no single

persons would have been able to witness what was happening

with his/her other family members at the other end because prime

object of the concerned person, at that time, would have been to

save his own skin. In this backdrop, failure to mention the name

of some accused persons in the FIR or in attributing specific role is

inconsequential. The appellants Prema Ram and Pancha Ram are

named in the FIR. The arguments advanced by Shri Kharlia that Dharu Ram Jajra has two sons and thus, the appellant Ravindra

alone cannot be singled out as the assailant cannot be appreciated

and accepted at this stage because he has been specifically named

as an assailant in the statements of the witnesses recorded by

CBI. Thus, at this stage, I am not inclined to enlarge any of the

appellants on bail.

Consequently, these appeals are dismissed as being devoid

of merit. Needless to say that the appellants shall be at liberty to

renew the prayer for bail in changed circumstances.