- (1.) The appellants viz. A1-Subal Ghorai, A2-Bishnupada Ghorai, A3-Ranjit Samanta (since deceased), A4-Sunil Senapati, A5 Pulin Sat @ Samanta, A6- Sudarshan Ghorai, A7-Nemai Ghorai, A8-Biswanath Ghorai, A9-Joydeb Ghori @ Bhatu, A10-Tarapada Samanta, A11-Bistu Samanta, A12-Bhanu Samanta, A13- Uttam Samanta @ Bhalu, A14-Sambhu Jana, A15-Dipu Samanta @ Dipak, A16-Subal Samanta (since deceased), A17-Dulal Samanta (since deceased), A18-Nentu Dhara (since deceased), A19-Rakhal Dhara, A20-Batul Dhara, A21-Kengal Senapati, A22-Nikhil Senapati, A23-Sibu Pramanik, A24-Dhiren Shee @ Singh (since deceased), A26-Niranjan Das, A28-Sambhu Samanta, A29-Probodh Jana, A35-Satrughna Patra and A36-Duryadhan Patra ("appellants accused") along with 7 other accused viz. A25-Subal Shee @ Singh, A27-Tapan Pramanik, A30- Padmalochan Das, A31-Dima Pramanik, A32-Manick Pramanik, A33-Sankar Das and A34-Bhakti Bhusan Maity were tried by the 4th Court of the Additional Sessions Judge, Midnapore in Sessions Trial Case No.XXIII of May, 1989, for offences punishable under Sections 147, 148, 302 read with Section 149, Section 324 read with Section 149 and Section 436 read with Section 149 of the Indian Penal Code ("the IPC").
(2.) It must be mentioned here that the charge-sheet mentioned the names of 39 persons but learned Additional Sessions Judge commenced the sessions trial in respect of 36 persons because out of 39 persons, 3 persons were held to be juveniles. Their trial was separated from that of the remaining 36 persons. For the sake of convenience, we shall refer to the accused as per the numbers assigned to them by the trial court.
(3.) The prosecution case shall be stated more in detail, a little later. Suffice it to state, at this stage, that the case of the prosecution in short was that on 14/5/1986, the goat of deceased-Hemanta damaged the paddy of A1-Subal. Juvenile delinquent-Gopal and his mother beat the said goat. Juvenile delinquent-Gopal was detained by deceased-Hemanta and, after sometime, he was released. This infuriated the accused. They came to the bund armed with weapons and attacked deceased-Hemanta, deceased-Manik and deceased-Gour, who succumbed to the injuries sustained by them. They also assaulted PW-2 Lakshmi, PW-5 Ananta, PW-12 Jamini and PW-13 Mandakini. PW- 1 Promila, the wife of Mohanta Dhara, who witnessed the incident, lodged the FIR. The accused were then arrested and tried as aforesaid. The prosecution in support of its case examined 20 witnesses. In defence, the accused examined 8 witnesses. They denied the prosecution case. A1-Subal Ghorai, A24-Dhiren Shee and A34-Bhakti Bhushan pleaded defence of alibi. ;