( 1 ) APPELLANT, Virender Kumar @ Bittoo S/o Sh. Hari Shanker r/o Village Maujpur has been convicted of an offence punishable under Section 302 of Indian Penal Code vide judgment dated April 20, 1989 of an Additional Sessions Judge, Shahdara and has been sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life and pay a fine of Rs. 1,000. 00 and in default to further undergo rigorous imprisonment for two years.

( 2 ) HE has filed this appeal challenging his conviction and the sentence. As a matter of fact, along with the appellant, Joginder Singh, Jaswant Singh and Ramesh Singh were also tried for the offence punishable under Section 302 read with Section 34 Indian Penal Code While Joginder Singh has been acquitted, Jaswant Singh and Ramesh Singh have been convicted for offence punishable under Section 324 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code and have been sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for two years each. Jaswant Singh and Ramesh Singh have not, it appears, filed any appeal against their conviction and sentences.

( 3 ) THE case of the prosecution, in brief, is that Public Witness 4 Lalla and his maternal uncle Maruf Public Witness 5 were working in a factory at New Seelampur at the relevant time. Ujjair, since deceased, was Maruf s brother s wife s brother. He had come from his village for sight seeing to Delhi on April 4, 1984 and he stayed with Public Witness 5 Maruf. On April 6, 1984, all of them at about 6. 45 P. M. had boarded a bus of Route No. 241 from Seelampur Bus Stand and Ujjair and Lalla had taken their seats on a berth in that bus whereas Maruf sat immediately on the back seat. The bus had reached Welcome bus stand where certain passengers boarded the bus. Out of them three were stated to be young boys of medium height and medium built who stood near the said berth where Ujjair and Lalla were sitting. One of the said boys required Ujjair to vacate the seat so that he could sit therein. But Lalla and Ujjair did not respond and the second boy remarked as to whether they had not heard the direction of the other boy that Ujjair should vacate the seat whereupon Ujjair retorted that he would not vacate the seat. The third boy then raised his voice and proclaimed that they would get the seat vacated then and there and he instigated his companion by uttering the words is sale ko bata do . On this the second boy whipped out a dagger from the right dub of his belt and stuck a blow on the left side chest of Ujjair as a result of which Ujjair started bleeding. An alarm was raised. Lalla and Ujjair gave support to Ujjair and required the driver to stop the bus but the moment the bus slowed down, the three assailants jumped from the running bus and made their escape. The bus stopped at Shahdara Chowk. Lalla and Maruf removed Ujjair in a rickshaw to a hospital where the doctor declared Ujjair as brought dead.

( 4 ) FROM the hospital an information was given to Police Station Shahdara which was recorded at Daily Diary No. 75a at about 8. 45 P. M, copy of which is Public Witness 20/a mentioning that Ujjair having knife injuries had been got admitted in the hospital by his relatives and he had died. S. I. Om Prakash along with Constable Ram Kishan proceeded to the hospital and after obtaining the M. L. C, Ex. PW11/a recorded the statement of Public Witness 4 Lalla, Ex. PW4/c and had sent the same vide his endorsement, Ex. PW10/b through Constable Ram Kishan on the basis of which the F. I. R. was registered, copy of which is Ex. PW10/c.

( 5 ) THE post-mortem on the dead body of Ujjair was performed by Dr. L. T. Ramani, Public Witness 18. He found one incised stab wound spindle shaped 2. 5cm x 1cm. x ? placed horizontally on the left side front of the chest at the level of nipples 4cm medial of the left nipple. Margins were regular and both ends were equally tapering. The said injury on internal examination was found to communicate with the left chest cavity through fourth inter coastal space and aft