Judgment

PALEKAR, J. :- The appellant Jagmohan Singh has been convicted under Section 302, IPC for the murder of one Chhotey Singh and sentenced to death by the learned Sessions Judge, Shahjahanpur. The conviction and the sentence are confirmed by the Allahabad High Court. On the appellant coming to this Court by special leave, special leave was granted limited to the question of sentence only.

2. The short facts of the case are that some six or seven years before the present offence one Shivraj Singh, father of Jagbir Singh a cousin of the appellant, was murdered. The deceased Chhotey Singh was charged for that murder but was eventually acquitted by the High Court. As a result of that murder, there was ill-feeling between Chhotey Singh, on the one hand, and the appellant and Jagbir Singh, on the other. Both of them were minors at the time of the murder of Shivraj Singh. But by now they had grown up and it is plain from the evidence that Chhotey Singh s murder was the result of this ill-feeling. Chhotey Singh was murdered on September 10, 1969 at about 5.00 P. M. A day earlier, there was a quarrel between Jagmohan Singh and Jagbir Singh, on the one hand and Chhotey Singh, on the othe