- (1.) This criminal appeal arises out of the judgment dated 22.9.2006 passed by the High Court of Punjab and Haryana in Criminal Appeal No. 890- DB of 2005 and Murder Reference No. 10 of 2005. The High Court dismissed the appeal of the accused persons and also reference was confirmed.
(2.) The appellants, along with two others, were tried for an offence under Section 302 read with Section 34 IPC for murder of one Kulwant Singh, his two sons Gurwinder Singh and Davinder Singh and his wife Sarabjit Kaur on 21.8.2000 at about 1.30 am and were convicted for murder and awarded death sentence.
(3.) The prosecution case, briefly stated, is as follows: Balwant Singh and Jaswant Singh are two sons of Sharam Singh (PW 1). Both Balwant Singh and Jaswant Singh died prior to the date of the incident on 21.8.2000. Sharam Singh's third son Kulwant Singh had two sons Gurwinder Singh and Davinder Singh. Sarabjit Kaur was his wife. PW1 (Sharam Singh) had 8 acres of land at Village Bhittewad, District Amritsar, which was mutated in his name. In the family partition, that 8 acres of land was divided into four shares, i.e. PW1 gave 2 acres of land each to his sons and wife and 2 acres of land was retained by him. 2nd appellant Jaj Singh and his brother Satnam Singh accused and his mother Amarjit Kaur accused, were pressurising on PW1 to get the land transferred in their names in the Revenue record. PW1 wanted them to spend the money for mutation, which was not done. There were frequent quarrels between PW1, 2nd appellant and Amarjit Kaur on that. They nurtured a feeling that PW1, under the influence of his son Kulwant Singh, would not mutate their shares in their names. About 8 to 9 days prior to the incident, 2nd appellant, Satnam Singh and 1st appellant Gurvail Singh went to the house of PW1and threatened him that in case he did not give their share in the land and mutated in their names, they would kill him and his son Kulwant Singh. On 20.8.2000, the appellants and other accused persons were found sitting on a cot outside the house of PW1, threatening PW1 and Kulwant Singh that they would not be spared, since the properties were not mutated in their names.;