judgment

Lokeshwar Singh Panta, J. –

1.The appellants have filed this appeal against the Judgment and Order dated August 03, 2005 passed by a Division Bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court at Chandigarh, confirming the conviction and sentence in respect of the offence punishable under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (for short the ‘IPC’) and a fine of Rs.2000/- with a default clause to undergo R.I. for six months awarded to Suraj Dev and imposing punishment of life imprisonment upon appellants Babu Ram and Indraj under Section 302 read with Section 34 of IPC and to pay a fine of Rs.2000/- each, in default of payment of fine to further suffer R.I. for six months each in Sessions Case No. 83 of 1993 Sessions Trial No.10 of 1997.

2.Briefly put, the facts may be summarized as follows :

On 03.03.1993 at about 7.30 PM, the complainant Sohan Lal (PW-2) on hearing some noise coming from the street near the house of Ram Pratap (PW-3) came out of his house with a torch in his hand. PWs. 2 and 3 saw that Babu Ram (A-1) and Indraj (A-2) had caught hold of Ant Ram while Suraj Dev (A-3) gave a blow with a ‘Rambi’ (an instrument for cutting leather by a cobbler) on the chest of Ant Ram. On