DHEERAJ Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) VIDE impugned judgment and order dated 03.07.2008, the appellant stands convicted for the offence of having murdered Sampada (hereinafter referred to as the Deceased) as also for the offence of having committed robbery in the house of the deceased.

(2.) THE case of the prosecution was that on 05.08.2004 Alisher PW-5, an acquaintance of the husband of the deceased, employed the appellant as a labourer on a temporary basis. On the same day i.e. 05.08.2004 Alisher PW-5, accompanied by the appellant went to the house of the deceased and both Alisher and the appellant stayed there in the night. In the afternoon of 09.08.2004 the deceased was found dead in her house. Soon before the death of the deceased, SI Ranbir Singh PW-3, a neighbor of the deceased, had seen the appellant coming out from the house of the deceased. The presence of the appellant in the house of the deceased soon before the death of the deceased is further confirmed from the fact that in the morning hours of 09.08.2004 the deceased had telephonic conversations with her husband and brother HC Savinder Singh PW-3 and Mukesh Rana PW-7, respectively wherein she informed them that the boy who had come with Alisher to her house on 05.08.2004 had again come to her house and is waiting there for Alisher. On being apprehended, the appellant made a disclosure statement in the presence of a public person namely Ramesh Kumar PW-7, wherein he stated that he can get recovered the things he had stolen from the house of the deceased. Pursuant thereto, the appellant led the police and Ramesh Kumar to a room which was let out by Shanti PW-11, to the appellant and got recovered certain things he had stolen from the house of the deceased including a licensed revolver belonging to Savinder Singh and the jewellery articles of the deceased. The said jewellery articles except the toe rings were duly identified in court by HC Savinder Singh PW-2, the husband of the deceased.

(3.) VIDE impugned judgment and order dated 03.07.2008, convicting the appellant, the learned Trial Judge has held that the testimony of Alisher PW-5, HC Savinder Singh PW-2, SI Ranbir Singh PW-3 and Mukesh Rana PW-6, establishes that the deceased was present in the company of the appellant around the time of the her death; that the testimony of Ramesh Kumar PW-7, HC Savinder Singh PW-2 and Savitri PW-11, establishes that the fruits of the crime were recovered at the instance of the appellant and that aforesaid two circumstances when linked together lead to an inference that the appellant is the perpetrator of the crime (s) with which he is charged.