IMPORTANT POINT
The trial Court's failure to put material circumstances to the accused during examination under Section 313 of the CrPC constituted a serious irregularity, warranting the acquittal of the appellant on grounds of benefit of doubt.

JUDGMENT :

Sanjay K. Agrawal, J.

1. Invoking the appellate jurisdiction of this Court under Section 374(2) of the CrPC, the sole appellant herein has preferred this appeal calling in question legality, validity and correctness of the judgment of conviction and order of sentence dated 12-7-2018 passed by the Additional Sessions Judge, Link Court, Kurud, District Dhamtari, in Sessions Trial No.61/2017, by which the sole appellant herein has been convicted for murder of his wife under Sections 302 & 201 of the IPC and sentenced to undergo imprisonment for life & pay fine of Rs. 100/-, in default, to further undergo rigorous imprisonment for one month and rigorous imprisonment for three years & pay fine of Rs. 100/-, in default, to further undergo rigorous imprisonment for one month, respectively.

2. Case of the prosecution, in short, is that on 22-8-2017 at 11:00 a.m., at Village Tarragondi, Police Station Bhakhara, District Dhamtari, the appellant strangulated his wife Smt. Tarabai Nishad with the help of a rope and in order to screen himself from the offence, hanged the dead body and thereby committed the offence. Thereafter, the appellant himself reported the matter to the police pursuant to which morgue intimation was registered vide Ex.P-4 and FIR was lodged vide Ex.P-14. Inquest over the dead body of the deceased was conducted vide Ex.P-3. Dead body of deceased Smt. Tarabai Nishad was sent for postmortem to Community Health Centre, Kurud vide Ex.P-1A. Postmortem was conducted by a team of two doctors namely, Dr. U.S. Navratna (PW-1) & Dr. Saroj Diwan (PW-14) vide Ex.P-1 and cause of death was stated to be cardio respiratory arrest due to strangulation lead to constriction at air passages, death to be homicidal in nature and mode of death to be asphyxia. Rope was seized vide Ex.P-7 from the place of incident.

3. Statements of the witnesses were recorded under Section 161 of the CrPC. After due investigation, the accused / appellant was charge-sheeted for offences under Sections 302 & 201 of the IPC and charge-sheet was filed before the jurisdictional criminal court i.e. Judicial Magistrate First Class, Kurud, and the case was committed to the Court of Sessions, Dhamtari from where the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Link Court, Kurud, District Dhamtari received the case on transfer for trial.

4. The accused / appellant the guilt and entered into defence. In order to bring home the offence, the prosecution examined as many as eighteen witnesses and exhibited 19 documents. The defence has neither examined any witness nor exhibited any document in support of its case. The accused / appellant was examined under Section 313 of the CrPC in which he denied the circumstances appearing against him, pleaded innocence and false implication in the crime in question.

5. The trial Court after appreciating oral and documentary evidence available on record, convicted and sentenced the appellant for offences under Sections 302 & 201 of the IPC, which is sought to be challenged by him by way of this criminal appeal under Section 374(2) of the CrPC.

6. Mr. B.P. Singh, learned counsel appearing for the appellant, would submit that the trial Court in paragraph 21 of the judgment has only recorded four incriminating circumstances viz., (i) death of the deceased was homicidal in nature; (ii) the appellant has threatened the mother of the deceased to kill the deceased; (iii) medical officer has opined the death of the deceased to be homicidal in nature; and (iv) before the death of the deceased, the appellant used to torture the deceased and assault her, and held the same to be proved and only thereafter held that at the time of offence, the appellant was present in the house as per the statement of Deendayal Sahu (PW-12), but that has not been put to the appellant in his examination under Section 313 of the CrPC which causes serious prejudice to the appellant and thereby he is entitled for acquittal as Section 106 of the Evidence Act could not have be