- (1.) By Judgment dated 26.8.2013 in Sessions Case No. 39/11 (16/11), the court of Addl. Sessions Judge, Nagaur had acquitted three accused-persons,namely, (1) Peer Mohd., (2) Ms. Munni Bano and Anwar@Badda from the charges of Sections 302, 201 and 120B of Indian Penal Code and remaining two accused-persons,namely, (1) Shrawan Singh and (2) Barkat had been acquitted from the charge under Section 201 of Indian Penal Code.
(2.) The State of Rajasthan has filed D.B.Criminal Leave to Appeal No. 211/2013 against all the five accused-persons against the said judgment and Nawaji Khan, who is uncle of deceased Samaruddin has filed D.B.Criminal Appeal No. 922/2013 against the said judgment. After perusal of the record of the court below and after hearing the learned Public Prosecutor as well as learned counsel for appellant Nawaji Khan, this Court is of the view that no case for leave to appeal is made out in this case in favour of the State of Rajasthan and D.B.Criminal Appeal filed by the uncle of the deceased is also not meritorious and hence without issuing notice to any of the accusedpersons, that appeal also deserves to be summarily dismissed at this stage only, for the following reasons:- (1) It has been argued by the State that Ms. Munni Bano(respondent no.2) was wife of deceased Samruddin and she was having illicit relations with Anwar@Badda( respondent no.3) and Samruddin used to admonish Ms. Munni Bano for her illicit intimacy with Anwar@Badda and because of that reason Ms. Munni Bano had filed a dowry case also against Samruddin and in that case, a compromise had taken place between Samruddin and Ms. Munni Bano and this was a strong motive behind the murder of deceased Samruddin by Ms. Munni Bano in conspiracy of respondent nos. 1 and 3 but the trial court has ignored this strong motive. After hearing the parties before us, this Court is convinced that a person cannot be convicted only on the basis of strong motive unless his involvement or complicity in the alleged offence is proved beyond doubt. Hence the first argument raised by the learned Public Prosecutor as well as by the uncle of the deceased is not tenable. (2) Second argument raised by the learned Public Prosecutor as well as by Nawaji Khan is that the deceased was last seen with respondent no.2 by PW-5 Abdul Gafar and PW-31 Ali Mohd. and still the trial court has not properly appreciated the 'last seen evidence' in the true perspective. It has further been argued that when the dead body of Samruddin was recovered in a decomposed condition from a Well, Ms. Munni Bano(respondent no.2), being wife of Samruddin, neither felt sorry nor had offered any condolence towards the dead body and inspite of the fact that she was in knowledge that her husband might have been murdered by some one, she did not try to search for her husband and inspite of this evidence, the trial court has ignored the facts of the case and acquitted the accused. It has also been argued that PW-8 Pankaj Soni had stated in his statements under Section 161 Cr.P.C. that Ms. Munni Bano offered him to pay rupee one lac for murder of her husband and he did not accept the offer but inspite of such cogent evidence Ms. Munni Bano has wrongly been acquitted by the trial court. The aforesaid argument raised by the learned counsel for appellant-Nawaji Khan is also misconceived because PW-8 Pankaj Soni has been found to be a totally hostile witness and he has totally refused to have given any statement(Ex.P.26) to the police and he states that Ms. Munni Bano had never offered him rupees one lac to kill her husband.
(3.) So called 'last seen evidence' of PW-5 Abdul Gafar and PW-31 Ali Mohd. has also been duly analyzed by the trial court. PW-5 Abdul Gafar says that he had seen Samruddin wearing the same clothes which were worn by the decomposed dead body. He states that he had seen Samruddin on 12.9.2010 or 13.9.2010. He has not been able to give the correct date. He says that perhaps on 12.9.2010 he had seen Samruddin and Ms. Munni Bano at Harsor crossing. It is pertinent to mention here that the dead body was recovered from the Well on 18.10.2010. This witness, thus cannot be called a witness of last seen evidence. He states that he had started for search of Samruddin on 17.9.2010 and thenafter, perhaps after an interval of 25 days, he had come to know that Ms. Munni, Anwar, Peer Mohd and Barkat had killed Samruddin in conspiracy and they had thrown the dead body in the Well. He says that Pankaj Soni was saying that he had been offered an amount of rupee one lac for killing Samruddin. It is also worth mention here that PW-8 Pankaj Soni has not supported the statement of Abdul Gafar and he has been found to be a hostile witness. Thus, it can be said that so called last seen evidence given by PW-5 Abdul Gafar is meaningless and he has not been able to connect any of the accused-persons with the offence charged.;