Death due to burns soon after demand for dowry constitutes dowry death under S.304B IPC.

1. This appeal is directed against the judgment dated 18-2-2010 passed by Additional Sessions Judge, Durg in Sessions Trial No. 12/2009. By the impugned judgment, appellant Deepak Rajput has been convicted and sentenced in the following manner and co - accused Pawan Kumar and Smt. Rukmani Bai have been acquitted of the charges framed against them:
Appellant Deepak Rajput

2. The case of the prosecution, in brief, is as under :--
Marriage of deceased Parmeshwari Bai was solemnized with appellant Deepak Rajput on 8-7-2008. Co - accused Pawan Kumar Singh is father - in - law and Smt. Rukmani Bai is mother of co - accused Pawan Kumar Singh (grand mother - in - law of the deceased). Bhagwan Singh (PW 3) is brother and Maheshwari Rajput (PW 4) is sister and Amrit Bai (PW 5) is mother of the deceased. At the time of marriage, Bhagwan Singh (PW 3) and his father gave sufficient dowry but the appellant and co - accused persons were not satisfied with the amount / articles given in the marriage. According to the prosecution, the deceased had gone to her parental house and she stated that accused persons demanded Rs. 50,000/-, cooler, freez, almirah and sofa - set as dowry. The accused persons pressurized the deceased to pay Rs. 50,000/- and give above articles. On 11-8-2008 Bhagwan Singh (PW 3) received telephonic information that the deceased met with an accident. Bhagwan Singh (PW 3) and other family members went to the house of the appellant where the deceased was lying dead in burnt condition in toilet.

3. Bhagwan Singh (PW 3) reported the matter to Police Station Mohan Nagar, Durg where merg intimation (Ex. P / 3) and regular merg initiation (Ex. P / 7) were recorded. The investigating officer along with Tahsildar A. K. Shrivastava reached the place of occurrence, gave notice (Ex. P / 4) to the panches and prepared inquest (Ex. P / 5) on the dead body of the deceased. The dead body of the deceased was sent to District Hospital, Durg. The dead body of the deceased was referred to Department of Forensic, Medical College, Raipur for post - mortem examination. The post - mortem was conducted by Doctor Shiv Narayan Manjhi (PW 7) along with Doctor R. K. Singh and Doctor Supriti Sharma and they gave their report (Ex. P / 16), in which they mentioned that the cause of death was cardio respiratory failure as a result of burn injuries.

4. In further investigation, spot map (Ex. P / 2) was prepared by Patwari Prahlad Pandey (PW 2) and another spot map (Ex. P / 8) was prepared by the investigating officer. Regular First Information Report (FIR) (Ex. P / 9) was recorded in Police Station Mohan Nagar, Durg.

5. After completion of the investigation, charge - sheet was filed against the accused persons in the Court of Judicial Magistrate First Class, Durg, who, in turn, committed the case to the Court of Session, Durg, from where it was received on transfer by the Additional Sessions Judge, Durg, who conducted the trial and convicted and sentenced the appellant as mentioned above and acquitted co - accused Pawan Kumar Singh and Smt. Rukmani Bai of the charges framed against them.

6. In support of its case, the prosecution examined Ambika Singh (PW1), Patwari Prahlad Pandey (PW 2), Bhagwan Singh (PW 3, brother of the deceased), Maheshwari Rajput (PW 4, sister of the deceased), Amrit Bai (PW 5, mother of the deceased), retired ASI R. N. Singh (PW 6) and Doctor Shivanarayan Manjhi (PW 7). The appellant did not examine any witness in his defence.

7. Shri P. K. Verma, learned Senior counsel for the appellant argued that the prosecution has utterly failed to prove the case against the appellant. Co - accused persons have been acquitted by the t