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1950 Supreme(Raj) 146

Rajasthan High Court
Nawal Kishore, C.J.
Sitaram - Appellant
Versus
The State - Respondents
S.B. Criminal Revision No. 241 of 1950
Decided On : October 03, 1950

Advocates Appeared:
Abdul Jalil, for the accused; Laxminarain, for Government Advocate

Headnote:Criminal P.C., S. 424—Appellate Court, judgment of—Finding of facts generally accepted final—Judgment should be self contained even if it agrees with trial court.Criminal Trial—Complainant filing complaint against two persons-Police Challan against one person only—Trial court linking complaint with Challan —Consolidation was held illegal and the procedure adopted by the trial court was held as resulting in miscarriage of justice—Case was sent back for de novo trial.

       The Court of a Sessions Judge is a court of first Criminal appela and its findings of fact are generally accepted in the High Court. Hence a grave responsibility rests on the shoulders of the Sessions Judge and the Judgment must be such as may clearly indicate that he had fully applied his mind to the facts and circumstances of the case. Even if it agrees with the judgment of the lower court and dismisses the appeal, it may not be necessary for it to write a long and elaborate judgment but the judgment should be independent and self - contained so that it may indicate that the appellate court had considered the case in a proper perspective and the High Court in revision may be able to follow it without reference to the trial courts judgment. (para 3)

Nawal Kishore, C.J.—This judgment will dispose of two criminal revisions No. 241 and 242 of 1950 preferred by Sitaram and Shankardan separately against the order of the learned Sessions fudge upholding their convictions and sentences.

2. The complainant Jaskaran and the accused Sankardan and Sitaram all belong to village Bevta Tehsil Jodhpur. There is absolutely no evidence on the record about the state of relations between them but from what follows they must have been bad. They are related to one another but there appears to have been no love lost between them. On the evening of the 31st of January 1948 some performance was going to be held in the village and Jaskaran was making seating arrangements for the audience in connection with it. Whether this performance was religious or otherwise, the evidence does not show. The allegation of the prosecution is that at about 9 P. M. When Jaskaran was busy making arrangements, the two accused namely Shankardan and Sitaram suddenly arrived. Shankardan was armed with a sword while Sitaram was carrying a lathi. Sitaram showered several lathi-blows on the face of Jaskaran with the result that he fell down and became unconscious. Thereafter, Shankardan inflicted injuries with his sword and then both of them ran away. Jaskaran was taken to Police Thana Jhanwar at the dead of the night in a bullock-cart by P. W. 9 Karnidan and two other persons and the First Information Report was lodged by him. He then came back to the Windham Hospital where his injuries were examined and he remained as indoor patient for 37 days upto 10th of March 1948. The medical report shows that he had received nine injuries in all, out of which six were contusions, one was an incised wound 4x1 on the jaw and one was the fracture of this jaw. A number of witnesses were examined during the coarse of the investigation by the police but no particular action was taken. Accordingly on 5th of May 1948, the complainant filed complaint against both the accused under section 307 and 325 of the Penal Code in the court of the District Magistrate Pholodi. It was however, ultimately disposed of by the Extra First Class Migistrate, Jodhpur. After the preliminary enquiry had been made by the Magistrate under section 202 of the Criminal Procedure Code, warrants were issued against the accused and the police was also directed to send the record of the investigation made by it after the First Information Report. This probably awakened the police and it not only produced the entire record but also put up a challan on 16th of November 1948 but implicated only one accused namely,Sitaram. The learned Migistrate of the trial court consolidated the challan as well as the complaint and recorded all the evidence in the challan. Not a single witness was recorded in the complaint and it appears that the expenses for the witnesses were also paid by the police. The prosecution produced 9 witnesses out of which five were put forward as eye-witnesses namely, P. W. I Jaskaran, P. W. 2 Bhaira, P. W. 3 Baluram, P. W. 7 Ranchhor and P. W. 8 Devi Lal. Both the accused denied having committed the offence and pleaded alibi and produced three witnesses in defence. The learned Magistrate relying upon the evidence produced by the prosecution convicted and sentenced Shankardan under section 325 of the Penal Code to two years rigorous imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 100/- and Sitaram under sec. 325 of the Penal Code to 15 months rigorous imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 50/-. On appeal the learned Sessions Judge upheld their convictions and sentances.

3. The learned counsel for the appellants has urged in the first instance that the learned Sessions Judge has not dealt with the case in a satisfactory manner. After perusing the judgment, there seems to be no doubt whatsoever that the learned Sessions Judge has turned out a very slip shod document. He has not discussed the evidence at all and disposed of the appeal with a simple observation that he did not find any s


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