An extra-judicial confession made before two witnesses who are not independent and could have been influenced by the police cannot be used to convict a person of murder.

( 1 ) THIS is an appeal from the judgment and order of Sri I. N. Misra, Sessions Judge, Mainpuri by which he convicted the appellant under Section 302, I. P. C. and sentenced him to imprisonment for life.

( 2 ) THE person who lost her life in this case was one Smt. Rewati. She was the wife of the appellant. It is said that the appellant suspected the fidelity of his wife and, he, therefore, on 4-10-70 at about 10 A. M. took her to his field on the pretext of scraping grass and there inflicted Khurpi blows on her as a result of which she, died. This incident was said to have been witnessed by Saifulli and Sannu. After killing his wife the appellant was alleged to have made an extra-judicial confession in regard to his guilt before Hemendra Singh and Sukhram. It is further alleged that after making that confession he went to P. S. Kuraoli and lodged a report (Ex. Ka-5) there at 11-30 A. M. In that report he admitted to have killed his wife with a Khurpi. He was arrested and put up in the thana lock-up. As no Sub-Inspector was present at the police station, Head Constable Zor Singh (P. W. 4) himself went to the place of occurrence reaching there at about noontime. Subsequently, the investigation of the case was entrusted to S. I. B. S. Sirohi (P. W. 7 ). He reached the spot at about 2-30 P. M. There he first held an inquest on the dead body of Smt. Rewati and prepared the inquest report Ex. Ka

2. He then despatched the dead body duly sealed to Mainpuri for postmortem. Later on, he inspected the locality, drew the site plan Ex. Ka11, recorded the statements of the material witnesses and collected blood from the spot.

( 3 ) THE post-mortem examination on the dead body of Smt. Rewati was conducted by Dr. O. P. Batra on 5-10-71 at 11 A. M. He found four incised wounds, two contusions and three linear abrasions on different parts of the dead body.

( 4 ) THE internal examination revealed fracture of ribs Nos. XI and XII.

( 5 ) ACCORDING to Dr. Batra, death was due to shock and haemorrhage as a result of the injuries received.

( 6 ) THE appellant pleaded not guilty and denied the allegations made against him. He stated that he had gone to lodge a report at the thana about the murder of his wife, but the police arrested him and trumped up this false case against him due to village Partibandi. He denied that he ever suspected the fidelity of his wife.

( 7 ) THE learned Sessions Judge found the prosecution case fully proved and he, therefore, convicted and sentenced the appellant as indicated above. Aggrieved, he has come up in appeal to this Court.

( 8 ) TWO witnesses were examined in this case to show that it was the appellant who had hacked his wife to death. They are Saifulli (P. W. 1) and Sannu (P. W. 2), The learned Sessions Judge, however, did not place reliance on their evidence as he felt that they were in some way or the other connected with the police We think the learned Sessions Judge was absolutely correct in this regard and he rightly ignored their evidence. After ignoring their evidence, the learned Sessions Judge proceeded to scrutinize the circumstances of the case and recorded a conviction against the appellant on the ground (1) that he had a motive to kill his wife because she was a woman of loose character (2) that the report made by him led to the discovery of the dead body of the deceased and the blood-stained Khurpi that was used in the commission of the crime and (3) that he made an extra-judicial confession admitting his guilt. Now so far as the first ground is concerned, there is no evidence worth the name to show that the deceased was a woman of loose character and that the appellant ever suspected her fidelity. None of the witnesses examined in this case has said a word about the deceased being a woman of bad character. On the other hand, we find that Panni (P. W. 1) has clearly mentioned in his statement that the deceased Smt. Rewati was a woman of good character. The learned Sessions Judge refu