BHAGWAN SINGH Vs. STATE OF CHHATTISGARH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal arises out of the judgment of conviction and order of sentence dtd. 30/6/2007 passed by the II Additional Sessions Judge (FTC), Ramanujganj, Distt. Sarguja in ST No.37/2007 convicting the appellants under Sec. 302/34 of IPC and sentencing them to undergo imprisonment for life and pay a fine of Rs.2000.00 with default stipulation.

(2.) As per prosecution case, on 29/8/2006 at about 8 am deceased Devlal had left his village to see his brother Jagarnath, who was not keeping well at Village-Manikpur. It is said that Basant (PW-7) had gone to graze his cattle and at about 2 pm on 29/8/2006 he saw a person lying on the footpath, the said person was later recognized by him to be Devlal. He immediately called Ramphal and both of them noticed number of injuries on the body of the deceased. Basant immediately returned back to his village and narrated the entire incident to his brother Rajnath and other villagers. As by that time it was dark in the night, the villagers kept guard on the dead body and on the second day i.e. 30/8/2006 as it was raining heavily and there was flood in the river, the body was kept in the village. On 31/8/2006 when the situation improved, the villagers went to Police Station - Ramanujganj where at the instance of PW-7 Basant merg intimation (Ex.P/26) was recorded at 1 pm and just after 15 minutes FIR (Ex.P/27) was registered under Sec. 302 of IPC against unknown person. Inquest on the dead body was conducted vide Ex.P/1 on 31/8/2006 and thereafter the body was sent for postmortem which was conducted on the same day by PW-5 Dr. SK Sinha vide Ex.P/19 wherein he noticed as many as nine injuries and opined that the cause of death was shock due to excessive hemorrhage and the death was homicidal in nature. On 19/9/2006 memorandum of appellant No.4 Ramnaresh was recorded vide Ex.P/2, pursuant to which axe and umbrella were seized vide Ex.P/9 and P/10. On 16/9/2006 memorandum of appellant No.1 Bhagwan Singh was recorded vide Ex.P/3, pursuant to which axe and bamboo stick were seized vide Ex.P/6 and P/7. On 16/9/2006 memorandum of appellant No.2 Lal Bahadur was recorded which led to recovery of bamboo stick vide Ex.P/8 and on the same day memorandum of appellant No.3 Rajdev was recorded and pursuant to which seizure of bamboo stick was made vide Ex.P/11. However, there is no FSL report on record. While framing charge, the trial Court framed charge under Sec. 302/34 of IPC against all the accused persons.

(3.) So as to hold the accused/appellants guilty, the prosecution examined 12 witnesses in all. Statements of the accused were also recorded under Sec. 313 of Cr.P.C. in which they denied the circumstances appearing against them in the prosecution case, pleaded innocence and false implication.