JUDGMENT :

A.V. RAVINDRA BABU, J.

1. This Criminal Appeal, under Section 374(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for short ‘the Cr.P.C’) is filed by the appellant, who was the accused in Sessions Case No. 129 of 2007, on the file of the Court of II Additional Sessions Judge, Kadapa at Proddatur (for short ‘the learned Additional Sessions Judge’) challenging the judgment, dated 26.07.2010, where under the learned Additional Sessions Judge found the accused guilty of the offence under Section 304(Part-II) of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (for short ‘IPC’) as against original charge under Section 302 IPC, and accordingly after questioning him about the quantum of sentence, convicted him under Section 235(2) Cr.P.C. and sentenced him to undergo Rigorous Imprisonment for seven years and to pay a fine of Rs.500/- in default to suffer Simple Imprisonment for fifteen days for the offence under Section 304 (Part-II) IPC.

2. The parties to this Criminal Appeal will hereinafter be referred to as described before the trial Court, for the sake of convenience.

3. Sessions Case No. 129 of 2007 before the learned Additional Sessions Judge, arose out of committal order in PRC No. 7 of 2007 on the file of the Court of I Additional Judicial Magistrate of First Class, Proddatur (for short ‘the learned Magistrate’) relating to Crime No. 20 of 2007 of Proddatur I Town Police Station.

4. The case of the prosecution, in brief, according to the averments in the charge sheet, filed by the Police pertaining to above Crime, is as follows:

LW-1 - de-facto complainant - A. Balanagamma, is resident of Vasanthapet street of Praddatur town. Anugonda Brahma Narayana @ Brahmaiah is the deceased (for short ‘the deceased’). Anugonda Balanagamma is the wife of the deceased and witness to the occurrence. Originally, LW-1 and the deceased belonged to Mittamanupalli of Mydukur Mandal. Accused married the sister of the deceased i.e. Obulamma about seven years ago. After that both LW-1 and the deceased shifted to Proddatur Town and they were residing at Door No. 25/678 of Vasanthapet Street. Deceased was working as a compounder in Dr. Vara Lakshmi’s Hospital.

LW-2 - Anugonda Nadipi Obanna and LW-3 - Anugonda Chinnakka are residents in the same street. Accused and his wife are also residing in the same street adjacent to the house of LWs. 2 and 3. Accused is living by dhobi work and he is also a butcher. Six months prior to the incident, accused was addicted to consume alcohol and used to beat his wife Obulamma demanding money from LWs. 2 and 3. Accused used to send his wife to the house of LWs. 2 and 3 to get money. LW-2 used to give some money to Obulamma, who is the wife of the accused. While so, on 18.02.2007, due to Sivarathri festival at about 05:00 p.m. accused came to the house of the deceased and demanded money for taking alcohol. LW-1 and the deceased tried to convince the accused saying that how many days they will fulfill his demand and that they have no money. Accused left the house threatening the deceased that he would come again and if he does pay the amount, he will kill the deceased.

On 18.02.2007 at 09:00 p.m. while LW-1 and the deceased were sitting in front of their house, the accused came to the house of the deceased with an intention to kill him and questioned the deceased for not providing money and informed him that he would kill him and picked up quarrel with them. When LW-1 questioned the accused as to why he would kill the deceased, accused pushed her aside and took the dagger from his waist and stabbed over the right side of the chest i.e. below the right arm pit (right side ribs) and caused severe bleeding injury to the deceased. The deceased raised hue and cry as ‘amma’. LW-1 also raised cries as accused is killing her husband. LW-2 N. Obanna, LW-3 N. Chinnakka, LW-4 D. Gurrappa and LW-5 N. Gangulaiah came there and witnessed the occurrence. Accused ran way from the scene of offence along with the dagger, used for commission of the offence.