The central legal point established in the judgment is the reliance on medical evidence and oral testimony to determine the nature of death as homicidal, establish motive, and evaluate the presence of the accused at the time of the incident.

JUDGMENT :

ABHAY S. WAGHWASE, J.

1. This appeal takes exception to the judgment and order of conviction passed by learned Additional Sessions Judge, Bhusawal dated 10.08.2015 in Sessions Case No. 443 of 2014, by which appellant came to be convicted and sentenced to suffer imprisonment for life and pay fine for commission of offence under Sections 302 of the Indian Penal Code [IPC].

Brief background of the case before trial court.

2. Deceased Savita was married to accused and out of their wedlock they had two children. Precise accusation of the prosecution is that accused suspected fidelity of Savita and after getting drunk, he used to beat her. She had also approached Women’s Grievances Cell at Jalgaon but later on, disputes inter se were resolved and she was back in the company of accused husband. On 08.06.2014, both accused and deceased went to collect fire wood and returned home in the evening around 6.00 p.m. Savita approached her brother PW1 Subhash and told him that in the afternoon that day, husband had again abused and beaten her after suspecting her character. Informant, his uncle and aunt approached accused around 8.00 p.m. and gave him understanding and even suggested that he should not stay with her and rather go to his own village.

3. Around 2 a.m. that night, informant brother woke up for urination and at that time, he claims that, accused was seen hurriedly going out of the house and in spite of being accosted, he did not respond and rather went ahead. Informant became suspicious and therefore he went in the room to see his sister, but he found her in hanging condition. Therefore, he raised hue and cry. Relatives gathered and information was given to police. In the morning, informant set law into motion by lodging FIR alleging that on the intervening night of 08.06.2014 and 09.06.2014, in the backdrop of suspicion of character, accused Raju throttled deceased Savita and thereafter hanged her body to feign it as a suicide. On the strength of such report, crime was registered and investigation was carried out and finally, accused was chargesheeted.

4. On assignment of case before learned Additional Sessions Judge, Bhusawal, trial commenced. Prosecution adduced oral as well as documentary evidence. Case of prosecution is rested on testimony of seven witnesses. Learned trial Judge heard both sides and thereafter, on appreciation of the evidence, reached to a conclusion that accused had committed murder of his wife Savita and hence he came to be convicted and sentenced as stated above. Hence this appeal.

SUBMISSIONS

On behalf of the appellant:

5. Learned counsel for the appellant took strong exception to the judgment by pointing out that at the first count, prosecution has not proved death of Savita to be only homicidal and not otherwise. On this count, learned counsel took us through the post-mortem findings and would point out that the autopsy doctor has not ruled out death to be suicidal and in spite of not issuing final cause of death, in substantive evidence doctor spoke about death to be homicidal due to strangulation. He next submitted that there is no evidence for namesake to suggest that accused was in the company of deceased that night. He pointed out that there is no corroboration to the testimony of informant brother, who claims seeing accused leaving house in the night at 2.00 a.m. It is pointed out that though PW1 informant Subhash claimed that he had informed his uncle, however, said uncle is not examined by prosecution for the best reasons known to it. Learned counsel submitted that out of two children, one child who was with mother and father, is also not examined by prosecution. Thus, according to him, material witnesses are withheld by prosecution. He would point out that though other relatives are examined by prosecution, it is apparent that by no means they can be said to be eye witnesses, rather they