BISHWANATH SINGH Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant along with 8 others stood trial before the Court of Session for offence under Section 302 read with Section 34 IPC. The Court of Session convicted all the accused including the appellant for the offence charged. The High Court, however, in appeal acquitted six of those accused persons. Amongst the three convicted the appellant figured. He alone has filed this appeal. The High Court on consideration of the evidence and other material available on the record has all the same altered the conviction to one under Section 326 read with S. 34 IPC and sentenced the appellant to three years R. I. while longer terms of sentences have been imposed on the other two convicted accused.

(2.) In the assault of the deceased, the role of the appellant is that he caused injuries to him with a stick. Injury No. 10 found on the deceased were multiple abrasions. That these were caused by a blunt weapon is beyond dispute. It was the deceased who himself reported the matter to the Police. In his Ferdbeyan, the name of the appellant prominently figures. The deceased after the receipt of the injuries survived for about 30 days whereafter he died. The Fardbeyan thus became a dying declaration and was admitted in evidence by the Court of Session. Before his death another statement of the deceased was recorded by a Magistrate in which the name of the appellant again figured as a participant. This too became a dying declaration supportive of the earlier one. Besides, the appellant being so named, P.Ws. 1, 9, 11 and 20, the eye-witnesses to the crime deposed about the participation of the appellant specifically as well as generally. In face of this state of evidence, it does not serve any purpose of the appellant when his learned counsel contends that the appellant cannot be held guilty for offence under Section 326 with the aid of Section 34 IPC when there is only one blunt weapon injury which has been attributed to the appellant. Constructive liability of the appellant in the crime on this argument cannot be ruled out. In so far as his participation in the crime is concerned, the contents of the dying declarations were almost a clincher, let apart the consistent and cogent evidence of the eye-witnesses. The involvement of the appellant having been firmly established in the commission of the crime, we feel the High Court committed no error in distinguishing his case from the other two convicted accused insofar as the imposition of sentence is concerned. As said before, the appellant has been awarded 3 years R. I. in comparison to his co-accused who have been awarded 7 years R. I. due to the formidable weapons they used against the deceased. There is, therefore, no scope for further reducing the sentence of the appellant from the one imposed.

(3.) For the aforesaid reasons, we find no merit in this appeal. The same is accordingly dismissed.