The main legal point established in the judgment is the importance of corroborating evidence in establishing guilt, the rejection of a plea of insanity based on the accused's actions indicating knowledge and intent, and the significance of the accused's judicial confession in influencing the court's decision.

Iqbal Ahmed Ansari, J.

1. The judgment and order under challenge in the present appeal was passed on 30-12-1997, by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Sonitpur, Tezpur, in Sessions Case No. 105 (S)/97, convicting the accused-appellant under Section 302, I.P.C. and sentencing him to suffer imprisonment for life and to pay a fine of Rs. 2000/- and in default, to suffer rigorous imprisonment for a further period of 6 months.

2. The case of the prosecution, as unfolded at the trial, may, in brief, be stated as follows. At the time of occurrence, the appellant used to live with his brothers in a house, which had a common courtyard with the house of deceased-Monorama. On 22-4-1997 at about 5.30 p.m., the accused-appellant, Dipak Bhattacharyya, gave blows with a dao on his grand-mother, Sushama Ray, and her elder sister, Monorama Bhattacharyya, at their house and caused their death. The appellant fled away from the place of occurrence, came to Sootea Police Station with the said dao in his hand and surrendered there. The dao produced by the accused was seized by Seizure List (Ext. 4) and a G.D. entry was made in this regard. Sootea Police Station G.D. Entry No. 123, dated 22-4-1997, being the said entry. Thereafter, Sri Sadhan Roy, son of deceased-Sushama Ray, lodged a written Ejahar (Ext. I) at the said Police Station and treating the same as First Information Report, police registered Sootea P.S. Case No. 40/97 under Section 302, I.P.C. against the accused-appellant. During the course of investigation, police visited the place of occurrence and held inquest over the said dead bodies. The accused-appellant made a judicial confession and upon completion of investigation, police laid charge-sheet against the accused-appellant under Section 302, I.P.C.

3. When the charge framed under Section 302, I.P.C. was read over and explained to the accused-appellant, he pleaded not guilty thereto and claimed to be tried.

4. In all prosecution examined as many as 9 witnesses including the Investigating Officer. The accused was also examined under Section 313, Cr. P.C. and in his examination aforementioned, the accused denied that he had committed the offence alleged to have been committed by him, the case of the accused being, in brief, thus. The relationship between the accused and the deceased used to be strained. The accused used to suffer from insanity. At the relevant time, he was incapable of thinking. He does not know what he had done. He made the judicial confession, because of beating received at the hands of the police. No evidence was, however, adduced by the defence.

5. On conclusion of the trial, learned trial Court found the accused-appellant guilty of the charge framed against him and convicted him accordingly and passed sentence against him as hereinabove indicated.

6. We have perused the records. We have heard Mr. T. J. Mahanta, learned amicus curiae, and Mr. P. Bora, learned Public Prosecutor.

7. In this case, P.W. 3 (Satyajit Roy Choudhury) and P.W. 4 (Smt. Priyanka Choudhury) have been examined as eye-witnesses to the occurrence. P.W. 1 (Sadhan Roy), P.W. 2 (Samrat Roy Choudhury) and P.W. 5 (Satyajit Roy) are the reported witnesses. P.W. 6 (Bhaskarjyoti Bora) is a witness to the alleged seizure of the weapon of assault, P.W. 7 (Dr. Atul Saikia) is the doctor, who performed autopsy over the said dead bodies, P.W. 8 (Animesh Das) is the Investigating Officer of this case and P.W. 9 (D. Mech) is the Judicial Magistrate, who recorded the judicial confession of the accused.

8. We, first, deal with the evidence of P.W. 7, who is the doctor and who performed post-mortem examination over the two dead bodies. This witness has deposed that on 23-4-1997, he was posted at Tezpur Civil Hospital and on that day, he performed postmortem examination on dead bodies of Sushama and Monorama. According to P.W. 7, his findings on holding post-mortem examination on the dead body of Sushama were as follows :

Healthy female body. Rigor morties pres