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2009(6) Supreme 732
SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
V.S. Sirpurkar and Deepak Verma, JJ.
Arun Kumar Sharma — Appellant
versus
State of Bihar — Respondent
Criminal Appeal No. 67 of 2003
Decided on : 5-10-2009
Facts of the Case :
Appellant and his parents were prosecuted herein in the instant case for committing murder of wife of appellant for dowry and also for subjecting her to cruelty on account of demand of dowry. Trial Court while acquitting accused persons from all charges onvicted appellant u/s 302 IPC. Appeal thereagainst was Dismissed by High Court confirming the judgment of conviction and sentence by Sessions Judge.
2.Present appeal has been filed against said order of High Court.
Findings of the Court :
Evidence of brother of deceased was extremely casual in nature. It was not known as to what this witness was doing at 6 O’clock at his sister’s place. Even after seeing his sister being murdered, he did nothing-It was also not known as to why this witness did not inform the police for 15 hrs., after the so called murder. The evidence of this witness was sought to be corroborated by the evidence of his father. Again, it was quite mysterious that even this witness who was a literate witness, did not do anything for the whole day and did not go to the police. It is only when the police came to the spot that he made his statement. Evidence of PW-3 was also extremely suspicious for the simple reason that even he, in spite of the fact that he was informed of the murder, yet kept quiet . FIR which was registered at about 9 or 9.30 at night was not sent to the Magistrate. Under Section 157 Cr.P.C., copy of the FIR has to be sent to the Magistrate. This never happened. Investigation Officer not even bothered to draw a spot Panchnama. Even the name of the informer was admittedly not there in the case diary. Judgments of Trial Court and High Court were also disappointing as there was no serious appreciation of evidence with reference to record. Accused was held entitled to benefit of doubt.Impugned judgments and orders of conviction passed by Trial Court and appellate Court were set aside.
Result : Appeal allowed
JUDGMENT
V.S. Sirpurkar, J.—
1. The sole accused appellant challenges the High Court judgment dismissing the riminal appeal and confirming the judgment of conviction and sentence by the Sessions Judge.
2. The prosecution story is an extremely short conspectus. As many as three persons, being Sitaram Sharma, Gayatri Devi Sharma and Arun Kumar Sharma were tried for offences under Section 302 read with Section 34 IPC and alternatively, under Section 304B read with Section 34 and 498A, IPC. Sitaram Sharma is father, Gayatri Devi is the mother while Arun Kumar Sharma (appellant) is the son. The allegation against all the three was that they committed the murder of Sushma Devi, wife of Arun Kumar Sharma for dowry and also subjected her to cruelty on account of demand of dowry. The Trial Court acquitted Sitaram Sharma and his wife Gayatri Devi Sharma but convicted Arun Kumar Sharma of the substantive offence under Section 302, IPC.
3. On 17.06.1994, at about 9.30 p.m., a telephonic massage was received in Lakhisarai police station that a woman was murdered by strangulation. On that basis, an entry, vide Entry No. 516, was made in the police diary and the offence was registered. The police immediately went to the spot of occurrence and got a fardbayaan registered from one Leeladhar Pradhan, the father – in – law of the accused who was ultimately examined as PW-4. It was complained that his daughter Smt. Sushma Devi was married to the accused Arun Kumar Sharma about four years back and after the marriage Arun Kumar always used to demand a motorcycle and a colour television from his wife and also used to threaten her that if his demands were not fulfilled he would drive her out of the house. It was claimed that the deceased always used to complain about this to her parents. It was claimed that 8-9 months prior to the incident, on account of the scolding, harassment and demands of dowry, Panchayat was held and PW – 4 had shown his inability to meet the demands made by the accused person. It was further claimed that at about 6 a.m. in the morning Anil Kumar Pradhan (PW- 1) who was none else but the brother of Sushma Devi and son of Leeladhar Pradhan (PW-4) went to his sister’s house for giving some articles. He saw three accused persons holding the deceased and Arun Kumar strangulating the deceased and after some time she died. The said Anil Kumar, therefore, ran back to his house and informed Leeladhar Pradhan (PW-4) about the incident and immediately thereafter the parents as well as Arun Kumar went to the house of Sushma where she was lying dead.
4. Further investigation was taken up. The inquest was held and the dead body was sent for autopsy whereupon it was found in the post-mortem report that the deceased had multiple bruises over front of neck varying in sizes and there was extra blood in the soft tissues of neck with fracture of hyoid bone of trachea.
5. The accused were not found present in the house and the house was found to be open. Ultimately, they came to be arrested only when they surrendered themselves after more than 10 days in the Court.
6. The charge-sheet came to be submitted for offences under Sections 304B, 498A read with Section 34 IPC. However, at the stage of trial, the offence under Section 302, IPC was also added. In support of the prosecution’s claim, Anil Kumar Pradhan was examined as PW-1 while Dr. Dharam Nath Chaudhari who conducted the post-mortem was examined as PW-2. One Om Prakash Vidyalankar was also examined as PW-3 in order to corroborate the evidence of PW-1. According to his version, he had seen Arun Kumar running from the house of his sister and expressing that his sister was murdered. Father of deceased Sushma, namely, Leeladhar was examined as PW-4. Including the police witnesses, in all 8 witnesses were examined by the prosecution.
7. Thus, the prosecution depended only on the single eye-witness, namely, Anil Kumar Pradhan as also on the other circumstance that within 7 years of her marriag
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