IN RE, GAVISIDDAPPA Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant Gavisiddappa has been convicted and sentenced to undergo imprisonment for life for the murder of his wife Shivalingavva on the 7th of January 1965 in Survey Number 36 of Kukanapalli Village. He has also been convicted u/s. 309 I. P.C. But in view of the life sentence passed against the appellant u/s. 302 I. P.C., the learned Sessions Judge passed no order of sentence for the offence u/s. 309 I. P.C. The appellant has been convicted by the Sessions Judge, Raichur on his plea of guilty.

(2.) The case against the appellant was that he murdered his wife and thereafter attempted to commit suicide by stabbing himself. His plea, as recorded, is as follows :

(3.) The appellant has preferred this appeal through the Superintendent of Central Jail, Bellary, against the said conviction and sentence. Mr. Devaraj, the learned counsel, who appeared for the appellant in this Court as amicus curiae, as our request, has urged that the conviction of the appellant is illegal on the grounds : (1) that the statement made by the appellant is not an unequivocal admission of the fact that he committed the murder of his wife to make him liable under S. 302 I. P.C., as at best the statement amounted to a plea that he killed his wife on grave and sudden provocation when he found her in the act of co-habiting with any other person, and (2) that the learned Judge should not have accepted the plea of guilty and based a conviction against the appellant in a serious case like this in which an accused has been charged for murder. In order to appreciate these contentions raised by Mr. Devaraj, it is necessary to quote the brief judgment of the learned Sessions Judge. It reads thus :