Puttu Lal and Anr. vs State

B. L. Loomba, J.—The two appellants Puttu Lal and Murli, real brothers, resident of village Qutbapur, Police Station Sakran, district Sitapur were convicted under Section 302 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code and sentenced of life imprisonment for having committed the murder of Rampal resident of the same village in the night between 5th stand 6th of May, 1976 at the Khalyan situate towards the southeast of the village at a distance of about 5060 paces from the abadi. The deceased |was aged about 28 years. Appellant Puttu at time of the commission of the offence was aged about 1516 years while appellant Murli was aged about 2830 years.

Motive alleged for the commission of the offence was the deceased Rampal misbehaved with the wife of appellant Puttu on Sunday preceding the date of occurrence. Both the appellants felt enraged and at about noon on the game day, armed with lathis, both the appellants went to the shop of Ahmad Ali where the deceased was also sitting and complained about the misbehaviour of the deceased. The deceased denied the accusation and there were challenge and counterchallenge from the side of the deceased and the appellants but for intervention of Ahmad Ali and others who were present there, they would have indulged in Marpit. The appellants are said to have held out a threat of revenge.

According to the prosecution case the deceased was sleeping at his Khalyan during the fateful night and his brother Mendai was also sleeping at his own Khalyan at a short distance and Soney Lal, Chunnoo and Gur Charan were also sleeping at various places in that Khalyan. At about 2 a. m the witnesses woke up on hearing cries of the deceased and they flashed torches and saw the two appellants assaulting the deceased. Puttu appellant was armed with a Bhala while appellant Murli was said to be having a Banka. The witnesses challenged the appellants and gave a chase up to a distance but they managed to escape. Rampal is said to have died a little thereafter. The Chaukidar of the village who was residing in the neighboring village was called and Mendar brother of the deceased then went to the police station situate at a distance of nine miles and lodged the first information report at 7. 30 a. m. on 651976. The investigation was started by Ram Raksh Pal Singh, SubInspector of the police station and the investigation proceeded the usual way. He went to the village and the place of occurrence, found the dead body at the alleged place, prepared the inquest report and took in possession the blood stained Razai and Kathri (a sort of bed cover) and sent dead body to the District Hospital, Sitapur. The postmortem examination was conducted by Dr. Gopalji Ojha, Medical Officer of District Hospital, Sitapur at 5 p.m. on 751976.

The factum of the murder of the deceased having taken place in the night between 5th and 6th May, 1976 at the Khalyan in question remained unchallenged by the accused persons at the trial. The defence, however, was one of innocence and having been falsely implicated because of enmity, the suggestion made was that the deceased was a bad character having several enemies and he was murdered by any of his enemies.

The prosecution examined five witnesses of facts, three of them claimed to be evewitnesses, namely Mendai P. W. 1, Spney Lal P. W. 2 and Chunnu P. W. 3 and the other two relating to the incident when the appellants are laid j to have gone to the shop of Ahmad Ali and complained about the misbehaviour of the deceased with the wife of appellant Puttu Lal. Learned Sessions Judge in his well considered judgment rejected the various grounds raised on behalf of the accused persons to challenge the veracity of the prosecution case and came to the conclusion that the prosecution had succeeded in proving its case beyond reasonable doubt.

Learned counsel for the appellants has urged three grounds to assail the judgment under appeal being firstly that the prosecution failed to establish the motive against the appellants for commission of this crime, that the testimony of the three witnesses examined as eyewitnesses is unreliable because the witnesses are partisan and their testimony is full of inconsistencies and contradictions and lastly that the prosecution case and the evidence led in its support is inconsistent with the medical evidence inasmuch as the injuries found on the dead body of the deceased could not have been caused by the weapons alleged to have been carried and used by the appellants.

No doubt, the best evidence on the question whether the deceased had misbehaved with the wife of Puttu Lal could be that of the lady herself and she has not been examined in the case by the prosecution, nevertheless there are statements of two witnesses of this aspect of the case being Ahmad Ali P. W. 5 and Shatruhan P. W. 1. We have been taken through the statements of these two witnesses and found nothing worthwhile to discredit the value of the testimony of these witnesses. Ahmad Ali is the person at whose shop the appellants are said to have come to complain about the misbehaviour of the deceased while he too was sitting at the shop. He was thus a natural witness to the incident. Nothing worth the name could be suggested to hold oat this witness as a person interested in the deceased family or being inimical against the accused appellants. The witness denied that he was a friend of deceased Rampal. According to him Mohammad Shafi and Shatruhan ware the other persons present at his shop at the relevant having come to make some purchases. Nothing substantial could be suggested against the other witness P. W. 7 Shaturhan who corroborated the statement of Ahmad Ali. Learned counsel for the appellants argues that while according to Ahmid Ali only twothree persons were present at his shop. Shatruhan stated that 3040 persons had arrived on hearing the quarrel between the deceased and the appellants. It is also argued that according to Shatruhan Lal the deceased had caught the hand of the wife of appellant Puttu. These contradictions appear to be minor and of no consequence. Catching hold of the hand of the lady would also be misbehaviour and as such the statements of the two witnesses cannot be said to be contradictory to each other. It is quite probable that there may be only two persons as customers present when the appellants complained and challenged and counterchallenges and the threat, the incident may have attracted some other persons who intervened and saved the situation from taking an ugly violent turn. The statements of the two witnesses appear to be reliable. There is no reason why these two persons have come forward to swear falsehood against the accusedappellants.

We then proceed to consider the statements of the three eyewitnesses namely, Mendai, Soney Lal and Chuauu. The statements of these three witnesses have been read over to us and we find nothing intrinsic in the testimoney of these witnesses to impair their credit. Mendai is the real brother of the deceased but nothing could be made but to show that the other two witnesses had any grudge against the appellants or were lose to the deceased and his family so as to have come to support a false case. As has been observed by the learned Sessions Judge, it was very natural for the village people to have slept at the Khalyan for the safety and protection of their crop which was lying there at the relevant time being 5th of May when substantial part of the Rabi crop is usually found at the Khalyan after having been reaped and in the process of being separated from the chaff and then brought to their homes. The presence of the witnesses near the place of occurrence could not as such be said to be unnatural. If the three witnesses were sleeping at the Khalyan as appears to be the position, they would have naturally woke up on hearing the alarm raised by the victim of the crime. Learned Sessions Judge has rightly mentioned that the villager staying at the Khalyan for the safety of their crop could be expected to be having torches. On hearing the alarm, the use of the torches was, obviously, natural and it could not be difficult for the witnesses to have seen and identified the assailants more so when they were well known persons being residents of the same village. The number and nature of the injuries received by the deceased is indicative of the fact that he had tried to ward off the attacks and it was not a case where the deceased was inflicted injuries while he was asleep and kept lying. la the process of infliction of injuries, witnesses could naturally have seen the assailants and recognized them. It is difficult to accept the arguments raised by the learned counsel for the appellants that the deceased with the support of three witnesses could have apprehended the assailants. The accused persons were armed with Bhala and Banka and the witnesses could be in a position to rush in or save the victim or to apprehend the assailants only if they had been armed with equally deadly weapons. On the whole, we find nothing which may enable us to differ from the assessment as to the testimony of the three eyewitnesses recorded by the trial Court. We are of the view that the three witnesses are natural witnesses and their testimony is worthy of credit. This brings us to the last submission of the learned counsel for the appellants, namely, that the prosecution case is not consistent with the medical evidence. It has been contended that the punctured wound, being injury No. 12 could not have been caused by the Bhala as alleged by the prosecution witnesses. These witnesses have stated that a Bhala is a four sided (Chaukunna) weapon. In his crossexamination Dr. Gopalji Ojha P. W. 4 stated that this injury could have been caused by a Bhala while remaining injuries could have been caused by a Banka. In crossexamination this witness stated that if the Bhala was four sided, the depth of the injury would have been greater than what it was found and it is not very probable that the injury in question was caused by a four cornered Bhala. Learned Sessions Judge rightly recorded that the instrument of offence was not before Dr. Ojha and as such his opinion could not be of much importance. All the witnesses had stated about Bhala in its general description and little variation in the shape and size of the Bhala in such indigenous weapons is not very unusual. Accordingly, this submission does not carry much force and the medical evidence cannot be said to be inconsistent with the prosecution case. Mendai P. W. 1 stated he did not chase the accused for long being afraid of the assailants who were armed with a Bhala and a Kanta. No advantage can be taken by the use of the word Kanta because such a statement could be made just by mistake. Moreover, the difference between a Kanta and a Banka is only as to the size of the handle, Banka having a small handle while Kanta being fitted with a long handle like a lathi. Accordingly, we record our agreement with the learned Sessions Judge that this discrepancy is not material and that the medical evidence is not inconsistent with the prosecution case.

It appears that on behalf of the defence it was submitted that the First Information Report was antetimed and was. in fact, lodged much later than what is shown in the police papers. Basis of this argument appears to be the delay caused in arrival of the dead body at the mortuary and then in postmortem examination. The constable who was entrusted with the dead body has explained that he had to go to the District Head Quarters in order to fetch the police vehicle for taking the dead body to the mortuary, the distance being 2530 miles. His explanation was consistent with the entries made in the record of the police lines where he was shown to have arrived at 9.30 a.m. on 651976 and again on 751976 at 1 p.m. when he brought the dead body. This explanation was accepted by the learned Sessions Judge and we find nothing to differ with the finding of the learned Sessions Judge. The fact that the First Information Report of the occurrence was promptly lodged lends support to the prosecution case.

For the reasons as above, we find no merit in the submissions raised to assail the judgment of the learned Sessions Judge. We confirm the judgment of the trial Court and uphold the conviction of the appellants and the punishment awarded against them by the learned Sessions Judge for the commission of the crime committed by them. The appeal is liable to be dismissed and is, accordingly dismissed. The appellants are on bail and shall be taken into custody to serve out the sentence awarded against them by the learned Sessions Judge. The Chief Judicial Magistrate, Sitapur shall send a compliance report within four weeks of the date of intimation of the dismissal of this appeal.