STATE Vs. M NARAYANASWAMY ALIAS NARAYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is one more of the distressing cases where a young married woman has been driven to suicide virtually in the first year of marriage and the allegation is that it was because of harassment for dowry. The learned State Public Prosecutor has seriously assailed the order of acquittal and he submitted that the evidence of the parents and the other supportive material is sufficient to establish that demands were made for securing additional dowry and that the deceased was harassed and ill-treated to the extent of driving her to suicide.

(2.) NORMALLY, we would have upheld the submission except for the fact that there are blemishes in the prosecution case itself insofar as the mother has given a version that materially differs from that of her husband. More importantly, there is a specific case made out that dowry and gold ornaments were given. The learned Trial Judge has pointed out that the status of the parents was so very poor that it is quite impossible that they could have done this. In totality, however unfortunate the result is, the material is not good enough to sustain a conviction and hence, we decline to interfere. The learned State Public Prosecutor then advanced a supplementary argument and he submitted that even if the main charge under Section 304-B of the IPC were to fail for these reasons that the accused can still be convicted of the offence under Section 498-A of the IPC as the Court must draw the inference that it was only such harassment and cruelty of an abnormal high order that forced her to end her life. There is a practical difficulty here in the way of the prosecution insofar as once the evidence fails to inspire confidence on the main charge, it would be in violation of the rules relating to appreciation of evidence if the Court were to accept the same evidence and hold that the subsidiary charge is established; the rule of consistency is one of the cardinal principles of criminal jurisprudence and something which a Court cannot lose sight of.

(3.) IN the aforesaid circumstances, the appeal fails and stands dismissed on merits.