The judgment emphasizes the principles governing appeals against acquittals and the need for the appellate court to refrain from interfering with the trial court's decision unless there is a manifest illegality or the decision is perverse.

K.S. Jhaveri, J.

1. Both these Criminal Appeals are preferred against judgment and order dated 26.2.2009 passed by learned Additional Sessions Judge, Vadodara in Sessions Case No. 87 of 2008. By the said judgment, accused No. 1 was convicted for offences punishable under Sections 302 and 201 of the Indian Penal Code, while accused No. 2 was acquitted of the charges levelled against her. For offence punishable under Section 302 of IPC, accused No. 1 was ordered to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life and ordered to pay fine of Rs. 1,000/- and in default, simple imprisonment for 15 days was imposed; for offence punishable under Section 201 of IPC, one years' rigorous imprisonment was awarded with fine of Rs. 500/- and in default, he was ordered to undergo further simple imprisonment for ten days. Being aggrieved by the impugned judgment, accused No. 1 has preferred Criminal Appeal No. 1553 of 2009, while Criminal Appeal No. 918 of 2009 is preferred by the State against acquittal of accused No. 2.

2. As these appeals are arising out of the same judgment rendered in connection with the same incident and the evidence is also common in all these appeals, the same are taken up for hearing together.

3. The case of the prosecution is that the accused persons were residing at house No. 63/B, Shrinagar Society, Vadodara, which was of the ownership of the deceased and the accused were tenant. The accused were paying rent of Rs. 500/- per month. The deceased was working at Gorva and on account of closure of the company, he went to his native place at Uttar Pradesh and, he used to come to collect the rent from the accused as there was arrears of Rs. 15,000/-. On 15.9.2007, both the accused in connivance with each other committed the offence and killed the deceased by strangulating his neck with nylon rope and threw the dead body of the deceased near boundary wall of Uma Tiles Company. Information was received by the police on 15.9.2007 that one dead was found near the aforesaid place in a gunny bag. Therefore, an accidental death case was registered.

3.1 Thereafter, investigation was carried out and role of the accused was revealed and the accidental case was converted into C.R. No. 310 of 2007. Thereafter, charge sheet was submitted against the accused persons in the Court of learned Magistrate for offences punishable under Sections 302 and 201 read with Section 114 of IPC. However, as the case was exclusively triable by the Court of Sessions, the same committed to Sessions Court. Thereafter, charge was framed against the accused persons. The accused persons pleaded not guilty and claimed to be tried.

3.2 During the trial, the prosecution had examined following witnesses;

Sr. no.	Name	Exhibit
1.	Suresh Manilal Macwan	9
2.	Shambhu Balubhai Rajput	10
3.	Ranjit Kashiram Chavda	11
4.	PSI, Vajabhai Nanjibhai Damor	13
5.	Pankajbhai Ramanbhai Parmar	20
6.	Vijaybhai Ratilal Parmar	21
7.	Maheshbhai Parsottambhai Parmar	22
8.	Sanjaybhai Daulatrav Patil	24
9.	Vishnubhai Dharamdatt Tiwari	25
10.	Chandravati Ramsagar, widow of the deceased.	27
11.	Irfanahemad Sharif Shaikh	28
12.	Jignesh Mahendrabhai Chauhan	29
13.	C. Velukutti Nair	30
14.	Udasha Hariram Yadav	31
15.	Rammilan Ramsukh	33
16.	Jagdishbhai Ranchhodbhai Desai, IO.	35
17.	Dr. Bijoysinh Ganpatsinhji Rathod	54
18.	Dr. Bhavesh Manubhai Nayak.	59
19.	Khimjibhai Devlabhai, PSI	60

3.3 The prosecution has also produced and relied upon following documentary evidence:--

Sr. No.	Description	Exh.
1.	Yadi sent to PSO	15
2.	Complaint of PSI, V.N. Damor	14
3.	Yadi for postmortem	17
4.	Inquest Panchnama	18
5.	Postmortem