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2015 Supreme(Pat) 1371
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA
I.A. Ansari and Mr. Vikash Jain, JJ.
Satish Kumar Singh @ Ballu, S/o Rajeshwar Prasad Singh - Appellant
Versus
The State of Bihar - Respondent
Criminal Appeal (DB) No. 981 and 947 of 2009
Decided On : 03-07-2015
For the Appellant : Mr. Jagdish Prasad, Mr. Alok Kumar Alok and Mr. Hanslal Kumar.
For the Respondent: Mr. Ajay Mishra, Mrs. Soni Shrivastava, Mr. Abhimanyu Sharma, Mrs. Fauzia Shakil.
The main legal point established in the judgment is the requirement for the prosecution to meet the standard of proof in a criminal trial. The judgment also highlights the illegality of tendering witnesses and the importance of proving the admissibility of evidence.
Headnote:
Dowry Death - Indian Penal Code - Section 304-B, Section 201 read with Section 34 - The court discussed the evidence and concluded that the charge for dowry death and the charge under Section 201 read with 34 of the Indian Penal Code failed due to lack of evidence. The accused-appellant was acquitted under the benefit of doubt.
Fact of the Case:
Sarita Kumari died under suspicious circumstances, and her husband and his family were accused of dowry death and destroying evidence. The prosecution alleged that Sarita was subjected to cruelty due to non-fulfillment of dowry demands.
Finding of the Court:
The court found that the evidence presented by the prosecution did not meet the standard of proof required in a criminal trial. The court concluded that the accused-appellant should be given the benefit of the doubt and acquitted of the charges.
Issues: The principal issues were whether Sarita was subjected to cruelty due to dowry demands and whether the accused destroyed evidence. The court also addressed the legality of tendering witnesses and the admissibility of letters as evidence.
Ratio Decidendi: The court held that the evidence did not prove that Sarita was subjected to cruelty due to dowry demands or that the accused destroyed evidence. The court also emphasized the illegality of tendering witnesses and the lack of proof regarding the admissibility of certain letters as evidence.
Final Decision: The accused-appellant was acquitted of the charges of dowry death and destroying evidence. The court set aside the impugned conviction and sentences passed against the accused-appellant.
I.A. Ansari, J.
Sindhu Kumari alias Sarita died at the prime age of 25 years. Her husband, Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu, the remaining appellant herein, has been in prison for the last more than six years on the charges of having committed, along with his parents, dowry death and also on the accusation of having destroyed evidence in order to screen himself and his parents from punishment for the dowry death so committed.
2. Whether the appellant, Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu, along with his father, Rajeshwar Singh (since deceased), had destroyed the evidence of dowry death in order to screen himself and other co-accused from punishment are the principal questions, which have been raised in the present appeal, which has arisen out of the judgment, dated 26.08.2009, passed, in Sessions Trial No. 218 of 1999/426 of 2000, by learned Sessions Judge, Vaishali, at Hajipur, convicting the accused-appellant, Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu, and his father, the accused-appellant, Rajeshwar Singh (since deceased), under Section 304-B and 201 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code. Following their conviction under Section 304B read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code, the accused-appellant, Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu, and his father, accused-appellant, Rajeshwar Singh (since deceased), have been sentenced to suffer imprisonment for life. In consequence of their conviction under Section 201 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code, both the accused-appellants aforementioned have been directed to suffer rigorous imprisonment for three years and pay a fine to the tune of Rs.10,000/- each and, in default in payment of fine, the accused appellants have been sentenced to suffer rigorous imprisonment for a period of six months each, the sentences having been directed to run concurrently.
3. The case of the prosecution, as unfolded at the trial, may, in brief, be described as under:
(i) Sarita was given in marriage to accused Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu in the month of May, 1996, and to the best of his financial capacity, the informant, Krishna Nandan Singh, gave several articles and ornaments to his daughter. However, after the marriage was solemnized, demand for a scooter was raised by the family of accused Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu. Though this demand was satisfied, accused Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu remained dissatisfied and raised the further demand for a tractor. Due to his financial constrains, as the demand for tractor could not be met by the informant, accused Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu and his parents started pressurising Sarita to get a tractor from her father. Though Sarita informed her father about the said demand of tractor, her father was unable to meet the demand, whereupon accused Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu wrote a letter, addressed to the informant, demanding Rs. one lakh to start his business, his financial condition being not good. This demand also could not be satisfied by Sarita’s parents. This led to the informant’s daughter, Sarita, being subjected to torture.
(ii) In order to resolve the issue, the informant went, with some of his co-villagers and relatives, to the house of the accused and tried to persuade them to give up their demand for tractor or money. For a brief spell of time, raising of demand from the end of the accused subsided.
(iii) As the informant’s son was unemployed, the informant took loan from bank and, having purchased a tractor, gave the same to his son. On coming to know of the fact that the informant had given a tractor to his son, accused Satish Kumar Singh @ Bablu and his parents intensified their acts of torture on Sarita so much so that they stopped providing her with food and also started assaulting her.
(iv) Having come to know of the kind of treatment, which was being meted out to his daughter, the informant sent his son, Nityanand Kumar (PW 17), to the house of the accused to bring Sarita on the occasion of Deepawali festival; but the accused did not allow PW 17 to even meet his s
