1. The appellant was convicted for the offence of murder punishable under Section 302 IPC and sentenced to undergo imprisonment for life as well as to pay fine by the judgment of the learned Additional Sessions Judge dated 19.09.2011 in S.C. No. 196/2009. The order of sentence was passed on 24.09.2011. That judgment as well as the order of sentence are under appeal.

2. The prosecution case was that on 03.09.2005 at about 09.30 PM, in a vacant space in the Gali opposite the house of Umed Singh, at Harijan Mohalla, Village Naya Bans, Narela, the appellant hit one Shriram with a Jelly (a three-pronged forked spade-like weapon), which led to Shriram’s death. It was alleged that the crime was witnessed by PW-2, Rajbir and PW3 Madan Singh. The incident was reported, according to the prosecution, at around 09.53 PM (proved by the PCR form, Ex. PW-13/M). The statement of the first informant – Madan Singh was recorded in the early hours of 04.09.2005 (Ex. PW-13/J) and a First Information Report (FIR) was registered at 12.40 PM (Ex. PW-13/K). The deceased’s postmortem was conducted and the present appellant was arrested during the course of investigation. He was charged with