JUDGMENT :

B.A. PATIL, J.

1. The present appeal has been preferred by the appellant-accused challenging the legality and correctness of the judgment of conviction and order of sentence passed by II Addl. District and Sessions Judge, Vijayapura in S.C. No. 138/2008 dated 12.12.2011.

2. We have heard the learned counsel Sri. Sudheer Kulkarni, learned counsel appearing for the appellant and Sri. Prakash Yeli, learned Additional State Public Prosecutor for the respondent-State.

3. The genesis of the case of the prosecution in brief is that:

On 21.04.2008 at about 7.00 p.m. at Talikoti Town when the deceased was playing near Panch Shahi Darga, appellant enticed her by saying that he will give biscuit and took her to his rented house with an intention to commit rape; thereafter committed rape on the victim in the kitchen room of his house at about 7.30 p.m. thereafter he felt that she may narrate the incident to her parents and in that light he squeezed her neck and committed the murder; thereafter in order to screen the evidence he defaced the identity of the deceased by pouring kerosene over the dead-body of the deceased and set ablaze; thereafter he carried the half burnt body of the decea