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2019 Supreme(Bom) 172
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY BENCH AT NAGPUR
Sunil B. Shukre, S.M. Modak, JJ.
State of Maharashtra – Appellant
Versus
Anil – Respondent
Criminal Appeal No. 415 of 2008
Decided On : 15-02-2019
Palshikar, Ashish Fule.
The main legal principle established is that when two views are possible, the view that favors the accused should be adopted, and the benefit of doubt must go to the respondents.
Headnote:
Acquittal - Murder - Indian Penal Code, 1860, Sections 147, 148, 302, 201, 506 (II), 436 read with Section 149 and Explosive Substance Act, 1908, Sections 4 and 5
Fact of the Case:
The case involved the murder of a person who was abandoned by his family due to his bad habits. The accused were acquitted by the trial court due to insufficient and inconsistent evidence.
Finding of the Court:
The court found the prosecution evidence to be insufficient, inconsistent, and of doubtful origin, leading to a finding of innocence for all the appellants.
Issues: The key issues included the credibility of the eyewitnesses, delayed filing of the FIR, lack of corroborative evidence, and failure to identify the dead body.
Ratio Decidendi: The court emphasized that when two views are possible, the view that favors the accused should be adopted. The benefit of doubt was given to the respondents due to the doubtful nature of the evidence.
Final Decision: The appeal was dismissed, and the respondents were granted the benefit of doubt, resulting in their acquittal.
The case involved significant issues related to the identification of the accused and the deceased. The witnesses, PW-1 Mayaram and PW-2 Someshwar, claimed to have seen the incident from their house through a window, relying on moonlight for visibility. However, the court expressed doubts about whether the moonlight was sufficient to clearly recognize faces and actions of the accused persons from such a distance, especially since no specific evidence was provided to establish the luminance of the moonlight or its effectiveness in aiding identification (!) (!) .
Furthermore, the witnesses admitted that only two of the accused, Anil Lanjewar and Puneshwar (the juvenile), were standing in front of the house at the start of the incident, while the others, including Sunil Lanjewar and Munnasingh, were behind the house. The court noted that the witnesses did not explain how they could observe the actions of those behind the house, raising further doubts about the accuracy of their identification (!) .
The court also pointed out the absence of a proper Test Identification Parade, which is typically conducted to verify the identity of accused persons in such cases. Only respondent no. 3, Munna Singh, was identified during such a parade, and even that identification was questionable because the accused were produced before the court without their faces being covered, allowing their faces to be seen by the public and potentially influencing the witnesses' identification (!) .
Additionally, the dead body, purportedly of the deceased Ashok Ukey, could not be identified by anyone, including the witnesses, as confirmed by the post-mortem report. This lack of identification of the body added to the doubts about the case's credibility and the evidence linking the accused to the crime (!) .
In summary, the court found that the identification evidence was fraught with doubts due to insufficient visibility, lack of proper identification procedures, and the inability to conclusively identify the deceased, which significantly impacted the overall credibility of the prosecution's case (!) (!) (!) .
Sunil B. Shukre, J.
1. This appeal challenges the legality and correctness of the judgment and order dated 20th, 28th March, 2008 rendered in Sessions Trial No. 37 of 2006 by the Additional Sessions Judge, Gondia, thereby acquitting the appellants, namely Accused No. 1, Anil Lanjewar, Accused No. 3, Sunil Lanjewar and Accused No. 4, Munnasingh Madavi of the offences punishable under Sections 147, 148, 302 and Section 201 read with Section 149 and also Sections 506 (II) and 436 read with Section 149 of the Indian Penal Code and Sections 4 and 5 of the Explosive Substance Act, 1908.
2. The facts of the case, stated in brief, are as under:-
There resided a person named Ashok Lahu Ukey (deceased) in the year 2006 at village Barra (Bk.) Tq. & District Gondia, who was left all alone by his wife and children. The desertion by his other family members was owing to the rogue nature of the deceased and his bad habits. He was given to consumption of liquor and tempted to commit thefts on and off. He was also quite a quarrelsome person who would not let his other family members live peacefully and happily with him. After he was abandoned by his other family members, the bad qualities in the deceased were even exacerbated. He would wander here and there and only intermittently would come back to his house.
After one of this such listless sojourn, the deceased had returned to his house in the evening of 12th February, 2006. He again left the house in the night and came back home at about 9.00 p.m. of 13th February, 2006 and since then was stationed in the house itself.
The incident occurred in the fateful night between 13th and 14th February, 2006. It was about 1230 hours in the night, by which time, the day of 14th February, 2006 had commenced when the neighbour of the deceased, Mayaram son of Budhaji Barde, heard shouts of the deceased asking for help. Soon, he also heard some thumping noises on the roof top of his house. The remaining family members of Mayaram woke up and all of them, including Mayaram, came outside the house only to notice that deceased Ashok was running on the roof top for his life, while the appellants along with the two other persons were shouting at him and making menacing gestures at him thereby indicating their murderous intentions. The accused persons were also armed with such weapons as sticks and axe. The two of the accused persons, Anil (Appellant No. 1) and the juvenile accused, Puneshwar, were standing in front of the house of deceased Ashok, while the remaining three accused Sachin (not a party here), Anil [respondent no. 1, Sunil (respondent no. 2) and Munna Singh (respondent no. 3) were standing behind the house of deceased Ashok. One of the accused persons poked deceased Ashok by means of a long bamboo, as a result of which, deceased Ashok slipped from the roof top of the house of the complainant and tumbled down. Thereafter, it is alleged that these respondents and the other two accused persons beat up deceased Ashok and dragged him inside the house and by pouring petrol on his person, set him on fire. The fire was so intense that deceased Ashok died at the spot of incident itself.
The complainant and his family members, including his son, Someshwar, had watched the entire incident. But they had no courage to open their mouth. However, the Police Patil, Devraj, was informed of the incident with all its details by the complainant sometime after the incident or in the early morning of 14th February, 2006. Next day morning, which was of 14th February, 2006, several villagers gathered in front of the house of the deceased. But, the complainant did not inform anything to them. The complainant felt frightened so much. However, somehow or the other, he mustered courage and went to the Police Station in the afternoon and lodged a report of the incident at 1440 hours of 14th February, 2006. Police registered the offences disclosed in the oral report of the complainant and started the investigation. The neces
