JUDGMENT

MARKANDEY KATJU, J. —

“Hai maujazan ek kulzum-e-khoon kaash yahi ho

Aataa hai abhi dekhiye kya kya mere aage”

— Mirza Ghalib

1.This is yet another case of gruesome honour killing, this time by the accused-appellant of his own daughter.

2.Leave granted.

3.Heard learned counsels for the parties and perused the record.

4.The prosecution case is that the appellant was very annoyed with his daughter, who had left her husband Raju and was living in an incestuous relationship with her uncle, Sriniwas. This infuriated the appellant as he thought this conduct of his daughter Seema had dishonoured his family, and hence he strangulated her with an electric wire. The trial court convicted the appellant and this judgment was upheld by the High Court. Hence this appeal.

5.This is a case of circumstantial evidence, but it is settled law that a person can be convicted on circumstantial evidence provided the links in the chain of circumstances connects the accused with the crime beyond reasonable doubt vide Vijay Kumar Arora vs. State (NCT of Delhi), (2010) 2 SCC 353 (para 16.5), Aftab Ahmad Ansari vs. State of Uttaranchal, (2010) 2 SCC 583 (vide paragraphs 13 and 14), etc. In this case, we are satisfied that the prosecution has been able to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt by establishing all the links in the chain of circumstances.

6.In cases of circumstantial evidence motive is very important, unlike cases of direct evidence where it is not so important vide Wakkar and Anr. vs. State of Uttar Pradesh (2011) 3 SCC 306 (para 14). In the present case, the prosecution case was that the motive of the appellant in murdering his daughter was that she was living in adultery with one Sriniwas, who was the son of the maternal aunt of the appellant. The appellant felt humiliated by this, and to avenge the family honour he murdered his own daughter.

7.We have carefully gone through the judgment of the trial court as well as the High Court and we are of the opinion that the said judgments are correct.

8.The circumstances which connect the accused to the crime are:

(i)The motive of the crime which has already been mentioned above. In our country unfortunately ‘honour killing’ has become common place, as has been referred to in our judgment in Arumugam Servai vs. State of Tamil Nadu Criminal Appeal No.958 of 2011 (@SLP(Crl) No.8084 of 2009) pronounced on 19.4.2011.

Many people feel that they are dishonoured by the behaviour of the young man/woman, who is related to them or belonging to their caste because he/she is marrying against their wish or having an affair with someone, and hence they take the law into their own hands and kill or physically assault such person or commit some other atrocities on them. We have held in Lata Singh vs. State of U.P. & Anr. (2006) 5 SCC 475, that this is wholly illegal. If someone is not happy with the behaviour of his daughter or other person, who is his relation or of his caste, the maximum he can do is to cut off social relations with her/him, but he cannot take the law into his own hands by committing violence or giving threats of violence.

(ii)As per the post mortem report which was conducted at 11.45 am on 16.5.2006 the likely time of death of Seema was 32 hours prior to the post mortem. Giving a margin of two hours, plus or minus, it would be safe to conclude that Seema died sometime between 2.00 am to 6.00 am on 15.5.2006. However, the appellant, in whose house Seema was staying, did not inform the police or anybody else for a long time. It was only some unknown person who telephonically informed the police at 2.00 pm on 15.5.2006 that the appellant had murdered his own daughter. This omission by the appellant in not informing the police about the death of his daughter for about 10 hours was a totally unnatural conduct on his part.

(iii)The appellant had admitted that the deceased Seema had stayed in his house on the night of 14.5.2006/15.5.2006. The appellant’s mother was too old to commit the crime, and there i