IMPORTANT POINT
The judgment established that lack of clear motive or intention can impact the application of Section 302 IPC and lead to a reduced conviction under Section 304 Part I IPC.

JUDGMENT :

1. The accused-appellant in this appeal, through Jail, has been convicted and sentenced as below vide judgment of conviction and order of sentence dated 03.12.2014 passed by the learned District and Sessions Judge, Jaisalmer (Raj.), in Session Case No.02/2013 :

2. Brief facts of the case are that on 25.10.2012, in morning, the accused-appellant, wife of Chautharam Lohar, r/o Ramdevra had a fight with her sister-in-law i.e. Kamla Devi (hereinafter referred to as ‘deceased’) in relation to some firewood, and in connection therewith, the accused-appellant abused the deceased and threatened to kill her and her children; whereafter, the accused-appellant poured kerosene on Kamla Devi and set the deceased on fire, due to which the deceased severely burnt. Thereafter, the deceased was referred to the Government Community Health Centre, Pokran and information regarding the incident in question was given to PW-15 - Hukam Singh, SHO of Police Station, Ramdevra, and then the dying declaration Exhibit-15 was recorded by PW-15 and then one more dying declaration Exhibit-24 was also recorded in presence of PW-16-Tilok Chand, Sub-Divisional Magistrate, and thereafter, on the same day the FIR bearing No. 11/12 (Ex.-22) was registered under Section 307 IPC and the site of the incident in question was inspected, during course of which one Iron Tin, Matchbox, and half burnt clothes of the deceased were recovered; also the Naksha Mauka (Ex.-17) was also prepared by the investigating agency. Thereafter, the deceased was referred to the Mahatma Gandhi Hospital, Jodhpur, where she expired on very next day i.e. 26.10.2012.

2.1. Thereafter, the body of the deceased was referred for postmortem and during the course of investigation, the statements of the witnesses under Section 161 Cr.P.C. were also recorded and after completing the investigation, charge-sheet under Sections 302 and 447 IPC was filed against the accused-appellant, whereafter, the learned Trial Court framed the charges for the same against the accused-appellant, and the trial commenced accordingly. During the trial on 19.02.2014, Mangilal, son of the deceased and accused-appellant filed a compromise under Section 447 IPC and after due verification thereof, she was discharged, only to the extent of the charge, under Section 447 IPC.

2.2. During trial, the statements of total 17 witnesses were recorded and 24 documents were produced in evidence as well as total 3 articles, as evidence, were physically produced by the prosecution. Thereafter, the accused-appellant was examined under Section 313 Cr.P.C. where she denied all the charges and pleaded her innocence on the strength of the testimony of DW-1 and the statement of Mangilal recorded before the police was produced as Exhibit-D/1. and thus, she was made to stand trial.

2.3 Subsequently, after hearing learned counsel for the parties and examining the testimonies of the witnesses and other documentary evidence, the learned Trial Court passed the impugned judgment of conviction and order of sentence, as above.

3. Learned counsel for the accused-appellant submitted that the accused-appellant was convicted solely on the basis of the dying declarations EX-15 and EX-24, and except for such dying declarations, there are no eye-witnesses to the incident, who stated that the accused-appellant was involved in the crime in question.

3.1. Learned counsel further submitted that in the cross examination of PW-6-Dr. Rajkumar Khandelwal, he did not fully support the prosecution story, and even the dying declaration was also not recorded in the presence of the PW-6. Learned counsel also submitted that the statement of the said material witness, clearly makes the genuineness and authenticity of the two dying decla