JAI KUMAR Vs. STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Leave granted.

(2.) This appeal by the grant of special leave is directed against the order of confirmation of death sentence by the Division Bench of the High Court of Madhya Pradesh of Jabalpur. Since the appeal pertains to confirmation of death sentence by the High Court and the submission in support of the appeal is restricted to the question of sentence, it would be convenient to note at this juncture that it is only in the rarest of rare cases that this punishment is to be inflicted and it is on this score that Mr. Muralidhar, the amicus curiae appointed in the matter with his usual ability strongly contended that the punishment awarded by the Sessions Judge and as confirmed by the High Court, runs counter to the basic concept of law and justice of situation. As a part of the submission, Mr. Muralidhar placed strong reliance on Sections 235(2) and 354(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. But before consideration of the submissions on legal issue as above, it would be convenient to advert to the factual matrix of the matter in issue, in order to assess the situation as to whether the matter in issue in fact falls squarely and evenly on the category of rarest of the rare cases.

(3.) The factual score depicts that the appellant was charged under Section 302 read with Section 201 for committing murder of deceased Dev Vati, aged 30 years and a girl child Renu aged 8 years, on the night of 7th January, 1997. Both the lady and the girl child, however, were related to the accused, being the sister-in-law (brother's wife) and the niece respectively. Apart from the evidence tendered before the Court by the mother and the nephew respectively of the accused, the latter himself in his examination under Section 313 of the Code categorically stated and admitted the factum of murder - the situation, therefore, is that the accused admits of murdering his sister-in-law and the niece - and the reason put forth - the sister-in-law has not been giving him enough food and as such on being enraged therewith, this offence was committed - but what about the child ? Significantly there is no whisper pertaining thereto - is it because that the child witnessed the gruesome murder of the mother and as such the child shall also have to be eliminated - may be, but let us not proceed on any hypothesis, the fact remains however, that both the Sessions Judge and the High Court disbelieved this version of the accused.