B. N. Katju, J. - (1.) SOMPAL has filed this appeal against the judgment of Sessions Judge, Rampur dated 31-10-75 passed in Sessions Trial No. 113 of 1975 convicting him under Sec. 302 IPC and sentencing him to death.
(2.) THE case of the prosecution is that Sompal appellant is the son of Girdhar deceased. He was married but as he ill-treated his wife she was living with her parents since about a year and a half before the occurrence. He asked his father a number of times to bring his wife from the house of her parents but his father refused to do so and told him that as he was in the habit of beating his wife and was living separately from him he could not take the responsibility of bringing her back from the house of her parents. On 30-4-75 at about 7 p. m. Girdhari deceased and his younger son Bhagwati Prasad (PW 5) brought bundles of grass from the jungle to their house in village Khandia. Shortly thereafter the appellant came there from his room and told the deceased that he should bring his wife otherwise he would teach him a lesson. On hearing this the deceased scolded the appellant and told him that he would not go to bring his wife. THE appellant immediately thereafter went to his room which was at a distance of about three-paces and brought an open knife and gave a blow on the head of the deceased with the knife. When Bhagwati Prasad (PW 5) tried to save the deceased the appellant told him not to come near otherwise he would also be assaulted. Bhagwati Prasad then ran towards the door raising an alarm on hearing which Shiv Charan (PW 6) and others came to the place of occurrence and the appellant thereafter went inside his room and bolted it from inside. THEy asked the appellant to open his room but he did not do so. THEy then bolted the room from outside. THE deceased died on the spot as a result of the injury received by him. The first information report as lodged by Bhagwati Prasad (PW 5) at police station Azim Nagar at 10 p. m. on the same day (30-4-75), the distance of the police station from the place of occurrence being two miles. The first information report was lodged in the presence of S. O. Sukhvir Singh (PW 11). He came to the place of occurrence and found the appellant in his room which was bolted from outside. On his persuation the appellant came out of his room and told him that he had hidden the knife (Ext. L) in his room and took it out from a corner of his room and gave it to him. The knife was stained with blood. v
(3.) THE prosecution examined two eye witnesses namely Bhagwati Prasad (PW 5) and Smt. Dharamia (PW 1). Shiv Charan (PW 6) deposed that when he along with others went inside the house of the deceased on hearing shrieks he found the appellant standing in front of his room armed with a knife and the deceased was lying in a pool of blood in the Angan of the house. The appellant thereafter went inside his room and bolted it from inside. He and others asked him to come out of the room but as he did not do so they bolted the room from outside.;