Judgment :

GANGULY, J.

1. This criminal appeal has been preferred from the judgment of the High Court in Criminal Appeal (DB) No. 1338 of 2007, dated 3.9.2008, whereby the High Court upheld the judgment and order of conviction passed by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Fast Track Court-IV, Motihari, East Champaran in Sessions Trial No. 101/16 of 2006/2007. The learned Sessions Court held the appellant guilty of criminal conspiracy for murder under sections 120B of IPC and of extortion under section 387 of IPC and sentenced him to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life and was fined for Rs.25,000/-for the offence of criminal conspiracy for murder under section 120B, in default of which he was to further undergo simple imprisonment for 1 year. He was further sentenced for seven years rigorous imprisonment under section 387 IPC and was fined Rs.5,000/-, in default of which to undergo simple imprisonment for six months.

2. The facts of the case are that the informant Shri Vikas Kumar Jha gave a fardbeyan to the effect that at about 5.00 P.M. on 23.7.2005, he had received a call on his telephone number 06252-239727, inquiring about his elder brother Shri Anil Kumar Jha. The informant stated before the police that his elder brother, the owner of a medical store, on the said date had been out of town. He submitted that he had communicated the same to the caller. Upon such reply, the caller disclosed himself as Mohan Singh, the appellant herein, and asked the informant to send him Rs.50,000/-. The informant submitted that he had similar conversations with the caller three to four times in the past. However, he then received another telephone call on 25.7.2005 from a cell phone number 9835273765. The caller threatened him that since the demand of money had not been fulfilled, the informant should be ready to face the consequences.

3. Upon his elder brother's return, the informant had narrated the events to him. However, his elder brother did not take the threat seriously.

4. On 3.8.2005, at about 9.00 P.M. when the informant was at a place called Balua Chowk, he had received a call from his driver Shri Dhanai Yadav on his cell phone to the effect that informant's elder brother and their father, Shri Sureshwar Jha, had been shot at while they were in their medical store, and that both of them had been rushed to Sadar Hospital. On reaching Sadar Hospital, the informant saw the dead body of his elder brother. He was intimated by the people there that his father had been shifted to another hospital called Rahman's Nursing Home. He was also told that the shots had been fired by one Laxmi Singh and Niraj Singh. Having heard this, the informant rushed to Rahman's Nursing Home, where his injured father told him that while Niraj Singh cleared the medical store of all the other people, Laxmi Singh had fired shots at him and Anil Kumar Jha with an A.K. 47 rifle, before fleeing from the scene. After narrating such events, his father became unconscious.

5. The informant further stated that his family had actually known the appellant and Laxmi Singh from an earlier incident in 2004, when on the occasion of Durga Puja, the two had sent a messenger to Anil Kumar Jha's medical store, demanding Rs.50,000/-or to face death in the alternative. He submitted that pursuant to this, they had preferred a complaint before the police, and that the matter was sub judice. He further stated that he had actually met the appellant once prior to the telephone calls when the latter had asked for money, as contribution for celebrations of Sarswati Puja and Durga Puja. The informant thus stated that his father and brother had been attacked by Laxmi Singh and Niraj Singh at the instance of Mohan Singh for not having paid the extortion money. The informant said so on the identification of the voice of the telephone caller as that of the appellant. He, however, did not follow up the calls made on 23rd and 25th of July, 2005 either with the appellant in person, or with