BALDEV Vs. STATE OF CHHATTISGARH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) All these criminal appeals have been preferred against the impugned judgment of conviction and order of sentence dtd. 22/7/2015 passed by the Court of First Additional Sessions Judge, Raipur, District Raipur, Chhattisgarh in Sessions Trial No. 228 of 2014, in which appellant -Chatur Dhruv (Criminal Appeal No. 1008 of 2015) was convicted for the offence under Sec. 302 of the Indian Penal Code (for short 'the IPC') and rest of the appellants in all the appeals were convicted under Sec. 302 read with Sec. 34 of the IPC and all of them were sentenced with life imprisonment and to pay fine of Rs.25,000.00 each and in default of payment of fine, to further undergo additional RI for two years.

(2.) The prosecution case, in brief, is that on 10/8/2014 at about 3:00 pm, Ashuram Dhruv (deceased) alongwith Vikas Sahu (PW-2) and Bhupendra Dhruv (PW-1) were on their way to home. They found the appellants drinking and eating on the middle of the road and they had parked their motorcycle nearby obstructing the road. The deceased and his associates asked the appellants to give them way, on which, appellant -Chatur Dhruv brandished a knife and threatened to kill them. The deceased and his associates came back to his house. Ashuram Dhruv (deceased) was enraged because of the conduct of appellant - Chatur Dhruv. He then armed himself with a rod and went to the spot where the appellants were eating and drinking. Seeing Ashuram Dhruv and his associates, the appellants abused them, thrashed them and in between when this was going on, appellant -Chatur Dhruv took out his knife and stabbed Ashuram Dhruv on his chest, who fell down bleeding.

(3.) Vikas Sahu (PW-2) and Ashwani Dhruv came to rescue Ashuram Dhruv (deceased), who was immediately taken to Medical College Hospital, Raipur, in an ambulance where he was declared dead. Bhupendra Dhruv (PW-1) lodged the morgue Intimation vide Ex. P/1 in police station Amanaka, Raipur and on his information, the First Information Report (Ex.P/2) was also lodged against appellants -Chatur Dhruv, Sanjay Dhruv and others. The police conducted the inquest procedure in which crime details form vide Ex.P/3 was prepared. Blood-stained soil and plain soil were seized from the spot of the incident vide Ex.P/4. The dead-body of the deceased was subjected to postmortem examination vide Ex.P/6. Dr. S.K. Bagh (PW-4) has opined that the cause of death was shock due to haemorrhage caused by the stab wound found on the chest of the deceased. Viscera of the deceased was preserved which was seized vide Ex.P/8. Appellant -Chatur Dhruv was apprehended and interrogated by the police and his memorandum statement Ex.P/10 was recorded, in which he made a statement for discovery of the knife. At the instance of appellant -Chatur Dhruv, one knife was seized vide Ex.P/11. The blood-stained clothes of appellant -Baldev @ Balbhadra were also seized. The appellants were formally arrested. Statements of the witnesses were recorded under Sec. 161 of the Cr.P.C. and on completion of the investigation, the charge-sheet was filed before the concerned Court.