JUDGMENT :

P.B. SURESH KUMAR, J.

1. This appeal under Section 374(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (the Code) by the accused in S.C. No. 794 of 2017 on the files of the Additional Sessions Court, Ernakulam, has been preferred challenging the conviction entered and the sentence passed against him in the said case.

2. A boy aged 10 years was killed brutally in an occurrence that took place on the street near his house while he was returning home from the nearby shop. The accused is a person residing in the neighbourhood of the residence of the deceased. One Ajithkumar was occupying a building owned by the father of the deceased on a rental arrangement. There was a physical altercation between the accused and Ajithkumar on a previous occasion. The case of the prosecution is that on account of the enmity of the accused towards Ajithkumar, the accused requested the father of the deceased to evict Ajithkumar from his house and since the father of the deceased did not pay heed to the said request of the accused, on 26.04.2016, at about 6.45 a.m. the accused stabbed multiple times on different parts of the body of the boy and he succumbed to the injuries within a short while on reaching t