An appellate court should not interfere with a sentence imposed by a trial court unless the sentence is manifestly inadequate.

Judgement

BOSE, J. : The only question here is about sentence.

2. The appellant Bed Raj and another, Sri Chand, were jointly charged with the murder of one Pheru. The Sessions Judge convicted Bed Raj under S. 304, Penal Code, and sentenced him to three years rigorous imprisonment. He acquitted Sri Chand.

3. Bed Raj appealed to the High Court and that Court, on admitting the appeal for hearing, issued notice to the appellant to show cause why the sentence should not be enhanced. The appeal and the revision were heard together. The appeal was disimissed and the High Court enhanced the sentence to ten years.

4. Now, though no limitation has been placed on the High Court s power to enhance it is nevertheless a judicial act and, like all judicial acts involving an exercise of discretion, must be exercised along well-known judicial lines. The only question before us is whether those lines have been observed in the present case.

5. The facts that have been found by the Sessions Judge and accepted by the High Court are to be found in the opening paragraph of the learned Sessions Judge s judgment. They are as follows :

"Roop Chand, the son of Bed Raj accused, was removing the dung of the bullocks of Pheru deceased from an open space near his cattleshed. Pheru protested to the boy and turned down the basket in which the boy had put the dung. The two accused who are brothers then came to the scene from their own cattle-shed which was nearby and there was an exchange of abuses between them and Pheru. The accused Sri Chand then caught hold of Pheru by the waist and Bed Raj accused took out a knife and stabbed him in 3 or 4 places. The knife was then left sticking in the neck of the deceased and the accused ran away."

6. The assault occurred about 8 o clock on the morning of 23-2-1952. Pheru was removed to the hospital and the Medical Officer Dr. Fateh Singh examined him and found that he was suffering from shock. He found three injuries on his person: all "simple". He gave the following description of them:

"(1) Incised and punctured wound 1/2" x 1/4" x 3/4" neck, right side lower part.

(2) Incised wound I" x 1/3" x 1/3" right deltoid region frontal and lower part above downward.

(3) Incised wound 1/2" x 1/6" x 1/4" Epigastric region." He said

"When Pheru was admitted in the hospital he was under shock but his condition was not dangerous...When Pheru came he could speak. He was not unconscious. As he was under shock no report was made for recording his dying declaration...I cannot give the definite cause of death. I cannot tell if such an injury can cause death. There was no haemorrhage from Pheru s neck after his arrival in my hospital."

Speaking of the injuries, the doctor said-

"Injuries 2 and 3 on the person of Pheru which were incised wounds were not punctured. It was not possible to inflict them from a sharp pointed weapon."

7. The appellant was also examined by the doctor and a slight simple injury, which could have been caused by a simple blunt weapon, was discovered. This indicates that there was a scuffle between the appellant and the deceased in which the appellant was hit over the nose and, up to a point, bears out what the appellant says in his defence, namely that Pheru was beating the appellant s son Rup Chand; he went there and tried to extricate Rup Chand; Pheru started beating him (the appellant) and he, the appellant, received a fist blow on the nose.

8. The depth of the injury on Pheru s neck was 3/4th of an inch. In this connection the doctor says-

"A knife can penetrate 1 1/2 or 2 inches in a case of deliberate stabbing."

9. Pheru died about 12-45 A.M. on 24-2-1952, that is to say, about 16 or 17 hours after the assault. The post-mortem was conducted by another doctor, Dr. J. K. Dwivedi. Describing the injury on the neck - the only one we need consider as the other two were slight - he said that clotted blood was present all round injury No. I and that-

"the right side dome of pleura is punctured under injury No. 1 and clotted