The court affirmed the death penalty for the murder conviction, citing the heinous nature of the crime and insufficient mitigating factors, reinforcing the gravity of the offense relative to the societal context.

JUDGMENT :

RAJEEV RANJAN PRASAD, J.

The death reference registered under Section 366 (1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (in short ‘CrPC’) and the Criminal Appeal preferred by the two appellants are arising out of the judgment of conviction dated 2^nd May, 2024 (hereinafter referred to as the 'impugned judgment') and the order of sentence dated 9^th May, 2024 (hereinafter referred to as the 'impugned order') passed by learned Additional Sessions Judge-19, Rohtas at Sasaram (hereinafter referred to as 'the learned trial court') in Sessions Trial No. 10 of 2022 arising out of Darihat P.S. Case No. 111 of 2021 dated 13^th July, 2021 registered under Section 302 /34 of the Indian Penal Code (in short ‘IPC’).

By the impugned judgment and order, the appellants have been convicted for the offences punishable under Sections 302 /34 IPC and have been sentenced to death.

2. The appellants Aman Singh and Sonal Singh in Criminal Appeal (DB) No. 691 of 2024 have prayed for setting aside the impugned judgment and order of the learned trial court. The prosecution case is based on the fardbeyan of Shakuntala Devi, wife of Late Vijay Singh, Resident of Village Khudrao, P.S.-Darihat, District-Rohtas recorded by ASI Bimlesh Kumar on 13^th July, 2021 at 23:00 Hrs. near postmortem house, Sadar Hospital, Sasaram. In her fardbeyan (Exhibit ‘3’), the informant, who is wife of one of the deceased and has been examined as PW-4 in course of trial, has stated as under:-

On 13.07.2021 at 18:00 Hours, when her husband Vijay Singh and her son Deepak Singh were at home then, her Pattidars, namely, (1) Ajay Singh, (2) Sonal Singh and (3) Aman Singh started ploughing the disputed land adjacent to the house. When her husband and her son went to stop them, then they started abusing them and assaulted them with fist and lathi. Somehow, her husband and her son fled away from there to Rang Bahadur Singh’s door. After some time, the accused persons while chasing came to Rang Bahadur Singh’s door and they abused her husband and her son and also started assaulting them with lathi/danda. In the meanwhile, her younger son Rakesh Singh also came there from Dehri and on seeing his father and brother getting assaulted, after pacifying the fight he took his father and brother to his old house towards kitta. Then the above three accused persons armed with sword while chasing them reached purana kitta and started hitting her husband and sons with sword. Sonal Singh with an intention to kill, hit her elder son Deepak Singh as a result of which he got cut on his neck, face, cheek, head and chest and blood started oozing out and he became unconscious. Aman Singh attacked her younger son Rakesh Singh with sword in his hand with an intention to kill him, Rakesh got cuts on both his hands, face, neck and head and fell unconscious. When her husband on seeing his children getting injured went to save them then Ajay Singh hit him with sword on his neck as a result of which he got a serious injury on his neck, he started bleeding profusely and he fell unconscious. Meanwhile, Gayatri Devi wife of Ajay Singh came with a spear in her hand and gave it to her hus