The main legal point established in the judgment is the requirement to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt based on the sufficiency of evidence.

JUDGMENT :

(Pankaj Purohit, J.)

This appeal preferred under Section 374 read with 389 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for short “the Code”) is directed against judgment and order dated 16/17.08.2013, passed by learned Sessions Judge, Pithoragarh in Sessions Trial No. 17 of 2012, State Vs. Banwari Lal, whereby the said court, on conclusion of trial held the appellant guilty for the offence under Section 302 IPC and sentenced him to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life, with a fine of Rs.20,000/-, and in default of making payment of fine the convict was directed to undergo six months additional simple imprisonment.

2. Facts of the case, in brief, are that on 17.06.2012 complainant P.W.1-Ganesh Dhami made a complaint (Ex. Ka-1) to Police Station Didihat with allegations that he and his cousin Deepak Dhami used to do labour work and were residing in the house of Prithawi Raj Singh Chufal; on 16.06.2012 he had gone to his work leaving behind his cousin; when he came back in the morning on 17.06.2012 at 06:30 A.M., he found his cousin lying on bed with a severe injury on his forehead with profuse bleeding; he informed his landlord and with help of his 3-4 associates, he took his injured cousin to Didihat hospital, doctors thereafter referred the injured to District Hospital, Pithoragarh. Accordingly, he took his brother to the said hospital, where his brother was declared brought dead; previously a labour from Lakhimpur Kheri (the accused) used to live with them, in the same room. However, 4-5 days before he had a quarrel with the deceased, therefore, he had doubt that the accused might have killed his cousin.

3. On the basis of the aforesaid FIR a criminal case was registered in Police Station Didihat on lodging of chick FIR (Ex. Ka-15) under Section 302 of IPC against unknown persons on 17.06.2012 at 13:30 hours.

4. The matter was investigated and the Investigating Officer arrested the accused, collected evidence against him, sent the body for conducting post-mortem examination, and on culmination of investigation, submitted a charge-sheet against him, in the court under Section 302 IPC. The Investigating Officer also sent the blood samples for forensic examination; the report given by the Forensic Science Laboratory, Dehradun, Uttarakhand is (Ex. Ka-17) on record. The Investigating Officer after completing the investigation submitted a charge-sheet (Ex. Ka-19) against the appellant. After complying with provision of 207 of the Code i.e., supplying copies of documents collected during investigation, the case was committed to the court of Sessions.

5. Vide order dated 06.10.2012 learned Sessions Judge, Pithoragarh proceeded to frame charges against the appellant under Section 302 IPC, which was denied by the appellant, and he claimed to be tried. The prosecution in order to prove its case produced as many as nine witnesses’ viz. P.W.1 Ganesh Dhami (informant), P.W.2-Prithawi Raj Singh Chufal (landlord of the deceased), P.W.3-Govind Singh, P.W.4-Dr. Sanjeev Kumar, who conducted post-mortem, P.W.5-Dinesh, P.W.6-S.I. Kishan Ram, P.W.7-Constable Deepak Jalal, P.W.8-S.I. Vishan Ram Arya and P.W.9-Uday Pratap Singh, the Judicial Magistrate.

6. The trial court on conclusion of trial, found the case to be proved against the appellant, beyond all reasonable doubts; and accordingly, the said court convicted and sentenced the accused as mentioned in para no.1 of this judgment. Feeling aggrieved, the present appeal has been preferred.

7. Before proceeding any further, we would like to advert the evidence led by the prosecution witness. P.W.1- Ganesh Dhami deposed in his testimony that deceased Deepak Dhami was his cousin; at the time of the incident deceased and appellant used to work for contractor-Chufal, who had given one room to them in his house where they lived together; on 16.06.2012 he had gone with the canter of contractor Prithawi Raj Singh Chufal for ferrying the sand and concrete towards Thal leaving behind his cousin-Dee