B.R. GAVAI, J.

1. The appellants have approached this Court being aggrieved by the judgment and order dated 5/12/2016 passed by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Nagpur in Sessions Trial No. 405/2014, thereby convicting appellants for the offence punishable under Section 302 read with Section 34 of Indian Penal Code and sentencing them to suffer imprisonment for life and to pay fine of Rs. 5000/- and in default, to suffer imprisonment for three months.

2. The prosecution case, in brief, as gathered from the material placed on record is thus:

On 4/7/2015 in the evening hours, accused no. 1 Mukesh, resident of village Dighori, presented himself in Police Station, Mouda along with Bolero vehicle No. MH 40-Y-1391 and informed that his said vehicle had dashed one Bandu Dhobale in between 5.30 p.m. and 6 p.m. near village Dighori. He informed that since he had fear that villagers would beat him, he came to Police Station. P.W. 18 P.I. Gaigole took entry with regard to the same in the station diary. He also took photographs of the vehicle. Thereafter P.W. 18 P.I. Gaigole along with other Police staff went to the spot. They found that one damaged motor cycle was lying near agricultural land of one Satyanarayan Agrawal. P.W. 3 Sunil met the Police party at the spot and informed that he was brother of deceased Bandu. On the same day, at about 9.15 p.m. he lodged a report in Police Station stating therein that his brother deceased Bandu had some money transactions with uncle of accused no. 1 Mukesh, namely, Sadaram Rohankar. It was also stated in the report that Bandu had come to P.W. 3 Sunil's house at Pardi, Nagpur and told him that prior to eight days, there was quarrel between him on one hand and accused no. 1 Mukesh, accused no. 2 Rajhans and accused no. 3 Sandeep on the other hand on account of amount and they had beaten him by hands and fist blows and also threatened to kill him. He further informed that on 4/7/2014 at 6 p.m. when he was at Nagpur, he received a mobile phone call from his cousin Rupesh that when Bandu was coming from Mahalgaon to Dighori on his motor-cycle, accused no. 1 Mukesh had dashed Bandu by his four wheeler, due to which Bandu had fallen down and blood was oozing from his body. He, therefore, came to his house, collected his mother, sister and wife and went to village Dighori by his friend's car. P.W. 3 Sunil had, therefore, lodged oral report against accused nos. 1 Mukesh, accused no. 2 Rajhans and accused no. 3 Sandeep.

3. On the basis of said oral report, Crime No. 164/2014 came to be registered for the offences punishable under Section 302 read with Section 34 of Indian Penal Code and Section 4/25 of the Arms Act. During investigation, Investigating Agency found that there were two more accused involved in the crime. As such, on completion of investigation, a charge-sheet came to be filed against five accused in the Court of learned Judicial Magistrate, First Class, Mouda. Since the case was exclusively triable by learned Sessions Judge, the same came to be committed to Sessions Court. The learned trial Judge framed charge against accused for the offences punishable under Sections 120-B, 302 read with Section 34 of Indian Penal Code and Section 4/25 of the Arms Act. The accused pleaded not guilty and claimed to be tried. On conclusion of trial, learned trial Judge acquitted accused nos. 4 and 5 and passed the order of conviction and sentence against present appellants as aforesaid. Being aggrieved thereby, the present appeals have been filed.

4. We have heard Shri Jaltare and Shri Daga, learned Counsel for appellants and Shri Patil, learned Additional Public Prosecutor for the respondent. With the assistance of learned Counsel for the parties, we have also scrutinized the entire evidence on record.

5. The prosecution case mainly rests on the evidence of three eye witnesses, namely, P.W. 2 Vinayak, P.W. 4 Pramod and P.W. 6 Mitaram. P.W. 2 Vinayak states in his evidence that the incident took pla