JUDGMENT

Dipak Misra, J.

The present appeal is directed against the judgment of conviction and order of sentence recorded by the High Court of Punjab and Haryana at Chandigarh in Criminal Appeal No. 245-DB of 1998 whereby the Division Bench has reversed the decision rendered by the learned Additional Sessions Judge (II), Jind wherein the learned trial Judge had acquitted the appellant and the co-accused, Joginder of the charges leveled against him under Sections 363/109/364-A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (‘IPC’ for short).

2. The facts which are requisite to be stated for disposal of the appeal are that Jaivir Singh, informant, PW-1, was residing jointly along with his two brothers at village Ikkas. His younger brother, Jagbir Singh, was an employee at Railway Police. The accused-appellant, Vinod Kumar, a resident of Bijwasan, had come to the village of PW-1 in the month of May, 1996 and worked as a domestic help in the house of Jagbir Singh. Jagbir Singh had four children and he had employed two servants one of whom was the present appellant. After working for four months in the house of Jagbir Singh, Vinod Kumar, as the prosecution story unfurls, kidnapped Anand, the 3 ½ year o