(1) THE appellant has been convicted under Section 302 for having committed the murder of one Gowri Amma on 16-2-1991 by the learned Sessions Judge, Kasaragod, and has been sentenced to imprisonment for life. On appeal the said conviction and sentence has been affirmed by the High Court of Kerala and hence the present appeal. It transpires from the records of the case that the accused himself lodged information at 9.00 a.m. on 17-2- 1991 that Gowri Amma had died and on the basis of the said statement the police registered a case and proceeded with the investigation. In course of investigation the investigating agency came to the conclusion that it was not a case of unnatural death but of murder, and as such registered a case under Section 302 and proceeded with further investigation. On completion of investigation being satisfied that prima facie case had been established against the accused-appellant, charge-sheet was submitted and on being committed the accused stood his trial. The plea of the accused is one of denial. The fact that the deceased met a homicidal death on account of stabbing injury to the neck is established through the evidence of the doctor, PW 2, who conducted the post-mortem examination on the dead body. But in the absence of any eyewitness to the occurrence the prosecution relied upon the circumstances established to bring home the charge against the accused-appellant. The circumstances, thus, relied upon by the prosecution have been enumerated in para 7 of the judgment of the High Court as under:

(1) The deceased was staying alone in her house along with the deceased.

(2) Her house was situated in a fairly big compound and it was quite probable that there would not have been any eyewitness to the occurrence.

(3) The deceased had no strained relationship, enmity and ill-will towards any other person.

(4) There was nothing at the scene of occurrence to indicate that the murder was committed for gain.

(5) The deceased had a strained relationship with the accused.

(6) The injuries found on the person of the deceased could have been inflicted with MO 7 knife which was found bloodstained near the dead body.

(7) The accused was present in the house of the deceased when PW 1 left that house at 6.15 p.m. on 16-2-1991.

(8) Neither the accused nor the deceased responded to the calls of PW 1 when he went to the house at 7.30 p.m. with a packet of tobacco for her.

(9) The accused went to PW 1 at about 8.30 p.m. that night and asked him to state falsely that the tobacco was purchased for the deceased not by him but by the accused himself for which he had gone out of the house.

(10) As (sic Same) group of blood was found on MOs 5 and 6, the clothes of the deceased (sic accused) and MOs 8 and 9, the clothes worn by the deceased at the time of her death.

(11) The accused retracted from his version given in Ext. P-1 and advanced a false version during the course of trial that he had left the house at 5 p.m.

(2) ON relying upon the aforesaid circumstances, the High Court affirmed the conviction of the appellant under Section 302 on the finding that the circumstances unerringly point towards the guilt of the accused. The question for consideration is whether any of the circumstances can be said to have not been proved and if all the circumstances can be said to have been proved then whether the circumstances thus proved are so complete that they point only towards the guilt of the accused and are inconsistent with the hypothesis of his innocence. Mr Lalit appearing for the appellant contended that Circumstances 1 to 5 cannot be held to be incriminating circumstances so far as the accused-appellant is concerned. He further contends that Circumstance 10 which could have been a clinching circumstance against the accused cannot be said to have been established by the prosecution, once the learned Sessions Judge and the High Court discarded the prosecution case that the accused wh