1. This revision arises out of a case where a poor young woman, a divorcee, had to die ultimately in the Maternity Hospital, Trichur, where she was taken days after a criminal abortion after being turned away from three hospitals in the local area. Kochu, 28, the first accused, a distant relative of Saffiya, 28, the deceased in the case, was in illicit intimacy with her which resulted in her pregnancy. This was aborted without her consent by Kochupennu, the second accused, 42, an unqualified native abortionist at the instance of Kochu, in furtherance of their common intention to cause criminal miscarriage, by administering certain medicine in the vagina of Saffiya. Saffiya was given in marriage while she was very young and two children, Sukkur aged 14 (Pw.1) and Salim, 12, were born to her during the wedlock. While Pw.1 was about 2 or 3 years of age Saffiya was divorced by her husband. Since then she was residing in a small thatched shed consisting of a small room and a kitchen thinly partitioned by cadjan leaves, along with her children. She was eking out her livelihood as an agricultural labourer. Kochu, a married man who was conducting a tea shop about half a kilomet