2006 Supreme(All) 2496
[2006(8) ADJ 313 (DB)]
ALLAHABAD HIGH COURT
(Division Bench)
BEFORE : R.C. DEEPAK AND V.D. CHATURVEDI, JJ.
HIRA LAL ——Appellant
Versus
STATE OF U.P. —Respondent
(Criminal Appeal No. 1865 of 1980, decided on 8th September, 2006)
P.N. Misra, Apul Misra, A.P. Mathur, Shashank Shekhar Giri for the Appellant; Devendra Upadhayay, S.K. Dubey, S.K. Chaubey, Shivendra Nath Singh and A.G.A. for the Opp. Party.
Headnote:(Indian) Penal Code, 1860—Section 302—Murder—Trial Court convicted and sentenced the appellant under Section 302, I.P.C. for causing death of his wife by administering poison—Allowing the appeal held that F.I.R. does not disclose the correct facts, there is contradiction in statements of various prosecution witness, medical examination report is based on conjectures and surmises that death of the deceased occurred due to poisioning, viscera report disclosing that no poison was found in any component of viscera thus the accused cannot be convicted on the basis of presumption and the present case is a case of without evidence and evidence without—Hence sentence and conviction of the Trial Court set aside. [Paras 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 16 and 17]
Hon’ble R.C. Deepak, J.—This criminal appeal has been filed by the appellant-accused Hira Lal for setting-aside the judgment and order passed by Sri I.P. Mittal, the then Additional Sessions Judge, Mirzapur dated 30.8.1980 in Sessions Trial No.43 of 1978 pertaining to Police Station Katra, District Mirzapur convicting and sentencing him to imprisonment for life under Section 302, IPC.
2. The facts of the prosecution case, briefly stated, are that the informant Munni Lal son of Baldev Prasad, resident of Mohalla Ganeshganj, Police Station Katra, District Mirzapur had solemnized the marriage of his daughter Gyani Devi with appellant-accused Hira Lal resident of the same Mohalla and District two or three years back. His daughter had been happily and peacefully living at the house of the appellant-accused. After two or three months after the marriage, the appellant-accused and the other members of his family started embarrassing, harassing, humiliating, troubling, turmoiling, beating and compelling her to ask for more dowry from her parents. Consequently, she happened to be extremely worried. She used to tell her parents and other members of the family about the anxieties and atrocities caused to her by appellant-accused and other members of his family. Consequently, she was unwilling to go to the house of the appellant-accused. Not only this, but also she very sorrowfully expressed before the parents and other members of the family that she would not visit the house of appellant-accused otherwise the appellant-accused would poison her to death. The informant and other members of her family, however, consoled her and asked appellant-accused not to cause/commit any evil deed in regard to her. The appellant-accused agreed and, therefore, the informant and other members of his family sent Gyani Devi along with the appellant-accused to his house. Two days before the occurrence, one Paras Nath informed the informant that the appellant-accused was beating his wife Gyani Devi in the night between 21/22.7.1977 and, therefore, she was weeping and crying. Consequently, the informant, accompanied by Bhola Nath, Chunni Lal, Rameshwar Prasad, Radhey Shyam, Shanker Lal, Purushottam, Durga Prasad and many others went to the house of the appellant-accused who happened to come out of his house and seeing them all there, started running away. Whereupon they all ran after him, who fell down at a short distance and received certain injuries. The informant and certain others named above beat the appellant-accused and caught hold of him. The appellant-accused with his folded hands confessed his guilt/crime expressing that he at the instance of his father administered poison to his wife Gyani Devi to death. The informant and others went to the upper storey of the house of the appellant-accused and found Gyani Devi dead there. The informant dictated the alleged report Exhibit Ka-1 on the spot to Bhola Nath in connection with the occurrence. He took this report to the Police Station concerned where the first information report Exhibit Ka-1 was written on the basis of the said report and a case as case crime No. 180 of 1977 under Section 302/328, IPC was registered. After the registration of the case, its investigation was initially entrusted to Sub-Inspector Bal Govind Tiwari and subsequent to Sub-Inspector/Station Officer Narendra Singh. S.I. Bal Govind Tiwari visited the place of occurrence and prepared its site plan Exhibit Ka-16. He took the dead body of Smt. Gyani Devi into his custody and prepared Panchayatnama Exhibit Ka-12 in connection therewith. He sent the dead body of Smt. Gyani Devi through Constable Naim Ullah for postmortem examination. Doctor D.D. Tripathi (P.W.5) conducted the postmortem on the dead body of Gyani Devi on 22.71977. His report is Exhibit Ka-3. He preserved viscera also as is clear from his report. The Investigating Officer S.I. Bal Govind Tiwari took down the statements of Munni Lal, Bhola Nath and Rameshwar Prasad.