JIBRIL Vs. STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In regard to the death of one Raghubir 4 persons were arraigned in the Sessions Court for the offence under Section 302 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code. The trial judge convicted all of them of the said offence and sentenced each of them to imprisonment for life. They filed appeals before the High Court of Allahabad and during the pendency of the appeals one of the convicted persons, by name Majid, died and therefore the case as against him stood abated. A Division Bench of the High Court confirmed the conviction and sentence on the remaining accused. They have filed these appeals by special leave.

(2.) The incident is alleged to have happened at 7.30 a. m. on 26.8.1979 on the field of deceased Raghubir. According to the prosecution case while Raghubir, in the company of his brother Hari Pal Singh (Public witness -2) , nephew Raj Bahadur Singh (Public witness -4) , another nephew Chattar Pal Singh (Public witness -1) and Daya Ram (Public witness 3) were engaged in cutting fodder grass, the 4 accused persons entered the field armed with firearms (one of them was armed with lathi). On the exhortation made by 1st accused - Ismail not to spare the deceased, the other accused started firing at the deceased. The victim fell down and the assailants went closer to him and continued their attack. The kith and kin of the deceased who were present there made an attempt to rescue the deceased but they were threatened and after accomplishing the target the Appellants fled away with their weapons.

(3.) The background for the aforesaid killing is said to be that members of the family of the deceased and the accused were at loggerheads due to earlier episodes. In one such episode father of Raghubir (Surat Singh) and his brother (Pratap Singh) were killed in 1959. Subsequently, in 1978 two brothers of the 1st accused were killed in a police encounter for which the accused entertained strong suspicion that it was done at the instance of the deceased Raghubir.