AI Structured Summary
Not yet generated for this judgment
Judgment
Umesh Chandra Dhyani, J.—Present Government Appeal and the Criminal Revision were preferred by the State of Uttarakhand and the complainant respectively against the judgment and order dated 3.12.2002 passed by the learned Sessions Judge, Rudrapur, District Udham Singh Nagar in Sessions Trial No. 215 of 2000, whereby accused/respondents Rajendra Singh, Bhupender Singh and Ranjeet Singh were acquitted of charge, of offence punishable u/s 302 of the Indian Penal Code (hereinafter referred to as IPC). The contention of the learned Deputy Advocate General was that the judgment and order passed by the learned Sessions Judge, Rudrapur, District Udham Singh Nagar was illegal and contrary to the facts and material evidence available on records. Learned trial court by wrongly disbelieving the prosecution evidence has wrongly acquitted accused/respondents. It was, therefore, prayed that the Government Appeal be allowed and impugned order of acquittal of accused/respondents may be set aside. A prayer was also made to convict and sentence the accused respondents according to law.
PW 1 Diler Singh wrote a complaint to Station Officer, Police Station Nanak Matta, Udham Singh Nagar enumerating the facts contained therein that he was a resident of Nagla Jogither. Accused Rajendra Singh had a dispute with him over some landed property. On 3.6.2000 in the morning, when Rajendra Singh and his son Bhupender Singh were digging Diler Singh''s field, Diler Singh refrained them from doing so. This resulted into altercation between the two. On the selfsame day, at 1:30 PM, Diler Singh''s son Pushpender was sitting at Jogither diversion. Diler Singh, his brother-in-law Papinder Singh and Kakka Singh were coming towards Jogither diversion. In the meantime, Ranjeet Singh came on his Suzuki motorcycle. Rajendra Singh and his son Bhupender Singh were the pillion riders. Ranjeet Singh parked his motorcycle. Rajendra Singh and Bhupender Singh were carrying swords in their hands and Ranjeet Singh was having kanta (a sharp edged weapon) in his hand. They chased the informant''s son Bhupender Singh with the intention to kill him. Pushpender raised an alarm. Diler Singh, his brother-in-law Papinder Singh and Jwala Singh tried to save Pushpender Singh, who entered the house of Mukhtyar Singh to save his life. Accused persons, too, entered the house of Mukhtyar Singh and inflicted blows of swords and kanta upon the victim. Pushpender Singh died. Accused persons fled away from the place of occurrence.
Chick FIR (Exhibit Ka-5) was lodged on the basis of the said complaint on 3.6.2000 at about 2:50 PM, and as has been said earlier that the incident took place on 3.6.2000 at about 1:30 PM. The distance between the place of occurrence and the police station concerned was eight kilometers and, hence, there appeared to be no delay in lodging the First Information Report, which was registered as Case Crime No. 214 of 2000 for the offence punishable u/s 302 of IPC.
Investigation began on the basis of the said FIR. After completion of the investigation and being satisfied with the fact that accused Rajendra Singh, Bhupender Singh and Ranjeet Singh committed murder of Pushpender Singh, a charge sheet for the offence punishable u/s 302 read with Section 34 of IPC was submitted against the said accused persons.
When the trial began and prosecution opened its case, charge for the offence punishable u/s 302 of IPC was framed against the accused persons, to which they pleaded not guilty and claimed trial. As many as nine witnesses, namely, PW 1 Diler Singh, PW 2 Jwala Singh, PW 3 Amarjeet Singh, PW 4 Kakka Singh, PW 5 Dr. Shailendra Kumar Mishra, PW 6 A.S.I. Vishnu Dayal, PW 7 Smt. Amarjeet Kaur, PW 8 Rakesh Chandra Thapliyal and PW 9 Nandan Singh Negi were examined by the prosecution. No evidence was given in defence. Incriminating evidence was put to the accused persons u/s 313 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, in which they said that they were falsely implicated in the case. After considering the evidence on record and after hearing both the sides, learned court below acquitted accused Rajendra Singh, Bhupender Singh and Ranjeet Singh of charge of offence punishable u/s 302 of IPC. Aggrieved against the said order of acquittal, Government Appeal No. 347 of 2007 and Criminal Revision No. 164 of 2003 have been filed by the State as well as by the complainant respectively.
PW 1, in his examination-in-chief, not only proved his complaint, but also proved the contents of the same. We are not required to repeat the same for the sake of brevity. The testimony of PW 1 was corroborated by Jwala Singh PW 2, who, too, was an eye witness like PW 1. PW 3 was the witness to the recovery of sword at the instance of Bhupender Singh consequent upon his confessional statement. PW 3 was a signatory to the recovery memo (Exhibit Ka-2). PW 4 Kakka Singh was the witness to the recovery of sword and kampa (a sharp edged weapon) consequent upon the confessional statement of accused Ranjeet Singh and Rajendra Singh. A blood-stained sword was recovered on the disclosure and pointing of Rajendra Singh and kampa was recovered on the disclosure and pointing of Ranjeet Singh. PW 4 was a signatory of recovery memo (Exhibit Ka-3). PW 5 Dr. Shailendra Kumar Mishra conducted post mortem on the dead body of the deceased on 4.6.2000. The Medical Officer, in his postmortem report (Exhibit Ka-4), found four incised wounds on the dead body of the deceased. Cause of death of the deceased, according to the Medical Officer, was shock and haemorrhage as a result of ante mortem injuries. He also said that the death of the victim was possible on 3.6.2000 at around 1:30 PM. The said injuries could be sustained by sharp edged weapon like sword and kanta. Injury No. 1, which was inflicted on the neck of the deceased, was fatal. PW 6 A.S.I. Vishnu Dayal, PW 8 S.I. Rakesh Chandra Thapliyal (I.O.) and PW 9 Constable Nandan Singh Negi October, 2000 (Exhibit Ka-19) found blood stains on every article. Such blood stains were found to be human blood, were formal witnesses. Incriminating articles along with other articles were sent to Forensic Science Laboratory for chemical examination. FSL vide report dated 30th.
PW 7 Smt. Amar Jeet Kaur was the main important witness. She was a nonpartisan witness. Her entire evidence is being reproduced here in order to show that she has fully corroborated the prosecution story and, as the things will subsequently come out, nothing surfaced in her cross examination to indicate that she was telling a lie. Her entire testimony is as follows:
All the three accused persons killed a boy in my house. I do not know the names of the accused persons and the name of the boy, who was killed. This incident took place about 2-2 � years ago. The assailants were carrying swords in their hands. I do not know about other things. When I was refraining the assailants from killing (the boy), my Kurta (shirt) was stained with blood. Victim fell on a Diwan (a wooden cot) after sustaining injuries. Thereafter, victim''s father and other people came. Police took my blood stained Kurta in their possession.
The Investigating Officer took my blood stained Kurta in his possession. A sealed bundle was opened in the Court.
The witness said that this was my Kurta, which was taken by the Investigating Officer in his possession. Exhibit-1 was put on Kurta. The Investigating Officer also took the bed-sheet, which was stained with blood. Exhibit-2 was put on the bed-sheet.
xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx
Nobody inflicted injuries on the victim after the victim fell on the wooden cot. Victim''s father and other people came within half an hour of departure of the assailants (from the place of occurrence). There is a telephone in my house. My husband gave the information to the Police Station on telephone (soon) after the incident.
Thus, it has come out that the entire evidence of PW 7 remains unchallenged. PW 7 said everything in favour of the prosecution, which was not challenged in her cross-examination. Incident took place inside the house of PW 7. It was argued on behalf of the accused persons that she did not disclose the names of the accused persons. The same does not matter, inasmuch as, she has used the words "accused persons" in order to clarify that these were the accused persons, who killed the victim. The death of the victim was under no dispute and so was the identity of the assailants, although PW 7 did not name either the victim or the assailants. The next argument advanced on behalf of the accused persons was that the name of PW 7 was not mentioned in the First Information Report. That also does not matter, inasmuch as, incident took place inside her house and there was no cross-examination on this point with PW 7. In this view of the matter, we hold that the learned court below has failed to appreciate the evidence of PW 7 as well as other prosecutions witnesses. Prosecution story was proved primarily on the strength of the eye-witness account given by PW 7, duly supported by medical evidence and other prosecution witnesses. An offence punishable u/s 302 of IPC read with Section 34 of IPC was proved against the accused respondents. In such view of the matter Government Appeal preferred by the State as well as Criminal Revision preferred on behalf of the complainant deserves to be allowed and the judgment and order under appeal is liable to be reversed.
Accordingly, Government Appeal No. 347 of 2007 preferred by the State of Uttarakhand and Criminal Revision No. 164 of 2003 preferred by the complainant against accused respondents Rajendra Singh, Bhupendra Singh and Ranjeet Singh succeed and are allowed. The order of acquittal recorded by the learned trial court in favour of accused respondents is set aside. Accused respondents Rajendra Singh, Bhupendra Singh and Ranjeet Singh are convicted of the offence punishable under Section-302 of IPC. Each one of them is sentenced to undergo imprisonment for life along with a fine of Rs. 10,000/-. In default of payment of fine, each accused will undergo further rigorous imprisonment for a period of six months. Accused respondents are directed to surrender before the court concerned to serve out the sentence hereby awarded to them by this Court. Let the lower court-record be sent back to the court concerned along with a copy of this judgment for ensuring compliance of the directions as above.