KHEM CHAND SHARMA, J. - (1.) THIS Criminal Appeal under Section 374 Cr. P. C. arises out of the judgment and order dated 21. 1. 1998 passed by the learned Sessions Judge, Dholpur, thereby convicting the accused appellants for offence under Section 302/34 IPC and sentencing reach of them to undergo imprisonment for life with a fine of Rs. 2000/-, in default thereof, each to undergo rigorous imprisonment for one year.
(2.) THE prosecution story unfolded during trial is that on 6. 3. 96 at 10. 30 PM, PW 2 Sarwan submitted a written report at Police Station, Sadar, Dholpur, stating therein that on the day of incident he had gone to some Sadhu Baba. At about 6. 30/7. 00 PM, one Hari Singh S/o Badan Singh of his village same to him and informed that some body has murdered his father Karan Singh at mustard field where he had gone to harvest mustard crop. He further informed that he came to his house and on enquiry, his wife Mahadevi informed that at the dusk of the day when she had gone to the field to call her father-in-law, she saw Ved Prakash, Dhola and Munshi running from the side of her field. THE complainant alleged that some long standing dispute as regards partition of land was going on between the parties and therefore, he doubted at the accused to have committed murder of his father. It was alleged that dead body of Karan Singh was lying at the field. On the basis of above written report, police registered a case against three accused for offence under Sections 302 read with Sec. 34 IPC vide FIR, Ex. P15 and proceeded with the investigation. In the course of investigation, the police rushed to the place of incident and prepared inquest report, Ex. P. 1, seizure memo of dead body, Ex. P. 3 and the site plan, Ex. P. 4. The police seized blood smeared soil from the place of incident vide seizure memo Ex. P. 5. The dead body was removed to the hospital, where PW 10 Dr. Ramesh Chandra Goyal conducted autopsy and prepared post mortem report, Ex. P. 7. Appellants Munshi Lal and Ved Prakash were arrested vide arrest memos, Ex. P. 9 and P. 10, respectively. The police then seized pents of Munshi Lal and Ved Prakash vide seizure memos, Ex. P. 11 and P. 12. Accused Ved Prakash furnished information, Ex. P. 16 as regards recovery of knife and pursuant to his information, the police recovered a knife vide memo Ex. P17 and prepared site plan, Ex. P. 18 of the place of recovery. The recovered and seized articles were sent to the Forensinc Science Laboratory. The report of Serologist is Ex. P. 19. Having completed investigation, the police submitted a charge sheet against the accused in the court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Dholpur. The learned Magistrate having found the case exclusively triable by the court of Sessions, committed the case to the court of Sessions Judge. After hearing counsel for the parties and on going through the evidence and material collected during investigation, the learned Sessions Judge framed charge against the accused appellants under Section 302 read with Sec. 34 IPC. The accused denied the charges and claimed trial. The prosecution, in support of its case, examined as many as 19 witnesses and got exhibited some documents. Thereafter, the accused were examined under Section 313 Cr. P. C. The accused examined DW 1 Bachhu Singh in their defence. At the conclusion of trial, the learned Sessions Judge found the accused appellants guilty of having committed murder of Karan Singh and accordingly convicted and sentenced both of them as mentioned herein above. Hence this appeal against conviction and sentence.
(3.) WE have heard learned counsel for the accused appellants and the learned Public Prosecutor and have gone through the judgment under appeal and the evidence on record. At the very out set it may be stated that there is no direct evidence and the case squarely rests on circumstantial evidence. In arriving at a conclusion of guilt, the learned trial court has relied upon following four circumstances; (i) the prosecution witnesses had seen the accused appellants running from the place of incident; (ii) seizure of pents (trousers) from the appellants at the time of their arrest and the pents were found to be stained with blood; (iii) recovery of blood stained knife at the instance of accused Ved Prakash, and (iv) dispute between the appellants and deceased Karan Singh in regard to partition of field. With a view to find out the correctness of the findings arrived at by the learned trial court, we have scanned the entire evidence on record. Firstly, we shall deal with the evidence concerning first circumstance as to the appellants having seen running from the place of incident. The first witness in the series is PW 4 Smt. Mahadevi, who is the daughter-in-law of deceased Karan Singh. She has deposed that on the day of Holi festival, her mother-in-law asked her whether she went to call `kaka' (Karan Singh) who had gone to harvest mustard crop. Thereupon, she along with PW 5 Sri Devi left for the field to call Karan Singh. PW 8 Bhoo Devi met them on the way, who was on her way to the field to collect cow dung cake (kandas) and she also accompanied them to the field. Soon they reached at the boundary (medh) of the field, they saw their father-in-law Karan Singh lying dead and accused Munshi and Ved Prakash were running from the field towards canal. In cross examination, the witness has given the description of the cloths worn by the accused appellants. PW 5 Mst. Sri Devi has given same version as that of PW 4 Mst. Mahadevi. PW 8 Mst. Bhoodevi has deposed that on the day of Holi festival she had gone to be to collect `kandas' at the field. She came down the boundary of the field to collect `kandas', while Mahadevi and Sri Devi left for collecting mustard at their field. On hearing the cries of Mahadevi and Sri Devi, she went running towards them and saw Ved Prakash S/o Babu and Munshi S/o Megh Singh running towards canal. She saw her father in law Karan Singh lying dead, having incised wound on his neck. After a short while, PW 3 Ram Prakash also reached there. PW 3 Ram Prakash has stated that on the day of incident at about 6/6. 30 PM when he was returning from his field, he saw accused Ved Prakash and Munshi running through the canal towards Basai- samanta. When he crossed the canal, he heard the cries. When he reached at the field of Karan Singh, he saw Karan Singh lying dead having incised wound on his neck. Mahadevi, Bhoo Devi and Phoolwati were present there, who disclosed that Munshi and Ved Prakash have ran away after killing Karan Singh. ;