JUDGMENT

Rajendra Badamikar, J. - The appellant/accused has filed this appeal under Section 374(2) of Cr.P.C. challenging the judgment of conviction and order of sentence passed by the Principal District and Sessions Judge, Dharwad in S.C. No. 6/2017 dated 13.11.2017 whereby the learned Sessions Judge has convicted the appellant/accused under Sections 302 and 201 of IPC and sentenced him imprisonment for life with fine of Rs. 5,000/- for the offence under Section 302 of IPC with default clause and rigorous imprisonment for a period of 3 years with fine of Rs. 5,000/- with default clause for the offence under Section 201 of IPC.

2. For the sake of convenience, parties shall be referred with the original ranks occupied by them before the trial court.

The brief factual matrix leading to the case are as under:

That the deceased Manjula was given in marriage to the accused about 8 years prior to her death. Accused, his wife and their minor daughters were residing in Hanamapur village. Earlier, the deceased Manjula @ Savita was suffering from tuberculosis and after she being cured, her marriage was solemnized. Further, it is also alleged that she had already undergone tubectomy operation and there was infection due to surgery and she had obtained treatment in her parental house. It is further case of the prosecution that 20 days prior to the date of filing of the complaint accused being son-in-law of the complainant took his wife and children to his house at Hanamanal. The accused used to reside separately with his wife and children in Hanamanal village while his parents used to reside separately in the same village. It is further case of the prosecution that, 4 days prior to her death, she had come to the house of the complainant and resided for one day and later on returned to her house along with her husband and children. It is further the allegation of the prosecution that accused was not doing any work and he used to subject the victim all along to ill-treatment in order to meet out his illegal demand of money for consumption of liquor. Deceased used to advise him to give up the habit of drinking, but the accused used to quarrel with her in this regard and subjected her to ill-treatment.

3. According to the prosecution, on 22.04.2016 at about 9.00 or 9.30 p.m. the deceased slept in her house along with her husband and children and it is alleged that at about 3.00 a.m. accused informed his brother-in-law i.e., another son of the complainant by name Parashuram and reported that his wife is not responding as she did not wake up in spite of all the efforts. The matter was brought to the notice of the complainant and immediately complainant along with other family members went to Hanamanal village where they found that deceased Manjula was sleeping on the that and she was already dead. As such, the complainant suspected some foul play and he lodged a complaint regarding unnatural death of his daughter as per Ex. P7. On the basis of the same, UDR crime No. 14/2016 was registered under Section 174 of Cr.P.C. and FIR came to be issued as per Ex. P20 to Taluka Executive Magistrate. Thereafter, scene of occurrence mahazar was conducted and inquest was also conducted on the dead body. Later on, postmortem was conducted on the dead body and the Medical Officer who has conducted the postmortem has collected viscera and hyoid bone and sent the same to KIMS Hospital and to FSL for examination. The postmortem report was received on 07.05.2016 and final opinion is withheld for want of FSL report.

4. It is also alleged that in the meanwhile, the complainant heard rumors that his daughter was strangulated by the accused. Then he went to Hanamanal village and enquired with the accused, but the accused did not respond properly and behaved as if nothing has happened. As such, after discussing this aspect, the complainant has filed a complaint against the accused for the offence under Section 302 of IPC. This complaint is marked at Ex. P8. The investigatin