AMRIK SINGH Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The three appellants before us were convicted by the Additional Sessions Judge, Ferozepore, under Section 302 of the India Penal Code for the murder of one Anoop Singh and were sentenced to imprisonment for life and to pay a fine of Rs. 200/- each. They were also found guilty of an offence under Section 449 of the Penal Code and were sentenced to 7 years' rigorous imprisonment. The Punjab and Haryana High Court dismissed the appeal preferred by the accused against the decision of the trial court. Before us the judgment of the High Court has been assailed on four grounds. It is contended that the time of occurrence was advanced by the prosecution to 6.00 p.m. but the incident took place much later. The basis of the contention is the presence of four ounces of semidigested food in the stomach of the deceased. The implication of the argument seems to be that if the incident took place when it was dark, a question of identification of the accused persons would arise. Anoop Singh was murdered when he was operating a chaff cutter machine in the courtyard of his house and so in any case there would be light in the place to enable him to operate the machine. This contention therefore has no sub-stance.

(2.) It is next urged that the prosecution case is not consistent with the medical evidence. The evidence of Harnam Singh, father of the victim, who was an eye-witness is that two of the accused were armed with rifles and one with a 12 bore gun and that all of them fired at his son. Counsel for the appellants argues that this evidence is not consistent with the fact that the injuries on the person of the deceased were pellet injuries. We do not think that there is any inconsistency here, It could be that only the shots from the 12 bore gun hit the victim. One is also not sure that the second injury mentioned in the injury report was not a bullet injury.

(3.) A plea of alibi was taken by one of the accused Ajit Singh who was in the army. According to him though he was on leave at the time when the occurrence took place, he had left the village and had joined his unit. He had certain documents summoned from his unit. Court Witness No. 2 produced a certificate which bears an endorsement to the effect that the appellant Ajit Singh joined on 18th September, 1971 at 5.00 p.m. Court Witness No. 1 Ajoit Singh produced a guest register of the Sikh Regimental Centre, Meerut, showing that on 17th September. 1971 a guest named Haveldar Ajit Singh came to meet Lance Naik Gutar Singh at 8 a.m. and left at 4,00 p.m. The High Court found it significant that neither Lance Naik Cutar Singh with whom Ajit Singh is supposed to have stayed as guest, nor the Subedar Major before whom his host had to present him in accordance with the procedure to establish his identity, had not been examined. The High Court held, therefore, that Ajit Singh had failed to establish his alibi. We find no reasons to take a different view.