The main legal point established in the judgment is the principle of granting the benefit of doubt when the evidence against the accused is weak.

JUDGMENT

Uday Umesh Lalit, J. - This appeal by special leave by original accused No.1 is directed against the judgment and order dated 23.10.2018 passed by the High Court of Chhatisgarh at Bilaspur in Criminal Appeal No. 265 of 2013.

2. Seven persons including the appellant were tried in the Court of Additional Sessions Judge, Keraghar, District Rajnandgaon, Chhattisgarh in Case Crime No.01/2011 in respect of offences punishable under Sections 460, 396 and 302 of the IPC and Section 25 of the Arms Act, 1959.

3. According to the prosecution: -

(a) In the intervening night of 31.08.2010 and 01.09.2010, a dacoity took place in the house of the deceased Bhanwarlal; that his son Lal Chand- PW-1 came to know about the dacoity in the morning when he found that his father Bhanwarlal and daughter Ashita were lying dead. The witness also noticed thatarticles kept in the room were lying scattered and certain gold and silver ornaments were missing. As a result of reporting made by said witness vide Exhibit P-1, the crime was registered and the investigation was undertaken. The reporting was against unknown persons.

(b) On 2nd of September, 2010, the appellant was arrested and after his arrest he made a statement in terms of Section 27 of the Indian Evidence Act which led to the recovery of a packet containing gold and silver ornaments which was hidden in a drain.

(c) The Test Identification of the ornaments was thereafter conducted by PW-20 Tehsildar R.P. Achala, during the process of which some of the witnesses identified certain items of jewellery and stated that those items were pledged by them with the deceased Bhanwarlal.

4. After completion of investigation, seven persons as stated above were tried before the Trial Court. The evidence led by the prosecution comprised of the recovered articles pursuant to the statement attributed to the present appellant, recovery of weapon attributed to a co-accused and chance finger prints which were found at the site in question, which were stated to be that of co-accused Madanlal Sahu (Original Accused No.2). The prosecution did not allege that the incident was witnessed by any person. The case thus, depended purely on circumstantial evidence.

5. After considering material evidence on record, the Trial Court by its judgmentand order dated 28.09.2012 accepted the case of the prosecution and convicted all the accused under Section 396 and 460 of the IPC. It also convicted accused Madan Lal, Puran Sahoo, Shiv Narayan, Chandra Kumar and Rajesh Rawal (A-2 to A-5 and A-7 respectively) under the provisions of Section 25 of the Arms Act. The Trial Court proceeded to impose the sentence of life imprisonment on two counts under Sections 396 and 460 of the IPC and those who were convicted under the Arms Act were awarded sentence of one-year rigorous imprisonment.

6. The convicted accused being aggrieved preferred individual appeals in the High Court. The appeals preferred by Shesh Narayan (A-4) Rajesh Rawat (A-7), Madanlal Sahu (A-2) Puran Sahu (A-3) and Niranjan Yadav (A-6) came up before the High Court and by its judgment and order dated 22.10.2019, all the accused except Madan Lal Sahoo were acquitted of the charges levelled against them. However, accused Madan Lal was found to be guilty under Sections 302, 392 read with Section 34 of the IPC and also under Section 25 of the Arms Act.

7. Later, Criminal Appeal No.265 of 2013 preferred by the present appellant and co-accused Chandra Kumar (A-5) came up before the High Court. While allowing the appeal preferred by Chandra Kumar (A-5), the appeal preferred by the appellant was dismissed and his conviction was altered to one under Section 302 read with Section 34 IPC, Section 392 read with 34 IPC and Section 25 of the Arms Act.

8. In this appeal, we have heard Mr. Kaustubh Shukla, learned Advocate appearingfor the appellant and Mr. Sourav Roy, learned Advocate appearing for the State.

9. Mr. Shukla submits that going by the material on record, the only piece of evidence