STATE Vs. RANJEET SINGH AND OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS Government Appeal, arises out against the judgment and order dated 18.2.1998, passed by 1st Additional Sessions Judge, Nainital, in S.T. No. 368 of 1996, whereby the ac­cused/respondents Ranjeet Singh, Jaswant Singh and Gurmel Singh have been acquit­ted of the charges under sections 147 and 302 read with section 149 I.P.C

(2.) THE prosecution story, in short, is that accused/respondents and complainant Harmeet Singh are related to each other. Prior to the incident, litigation pertaining to three acres land was going on between Jagjeet Singh, father of the complainant Harmeet Singh, and the accused persons and there was enmity among them in re­spect of the land. On 25.3.1996 deceased Jagjeet Singh had gone to attend a marriage at the house of his friend Gurmeet Singh in village Ganeshpur. When he did not return home upto 8-9 p.m., then complainant Harmeet Singh, Gurmel Singh, friend of the father of complainant, and Narpal Singh, maternal uncle of the complainant, went in search of his father in a tractor on Bazpur road. When these persons reached on Bazpur road, one kilometer away from their Birha Farm, then they in the red light of the tractor saw that motorcycle of Jagjeet Singh was lying in the field of Chaudhary. They stopped the tractor. They also saw that accused Ranjeet Singh was crushing Jagjeet Singh by tractor in the field of Chaudhary and accused Gurmel Singh and Jaswant Singh were sitting on the Bonnet of the tractor. On account of this incident, Jag­jeet Singh died at the spot. The complain­ant and his companion tried to get down from the tractor so as to save Jagjeet Singh, but accused Ranjeet Singh and his 3-4 asso­ciates did not permit them to do so and extended threats to their lives also.

(3.) THE investigation of the case was conducted by Sri Roop Singh Yadav, Station Officer. On 26.3.1996, S.I. P.C. Verma, P.W.5, accompanied the I.O. to the place of occurrence and conducted the inquest on the dead body of the deceased and pre­pared inquest report, Ext. Ka-2. He also prepared challan laas, Ext. Ka-5, Police Form-35, Ext. Ka-6, sketch dead body, Ext. Ka-7. Thereafter he sealed the dead body and sent it for post-mortem. On 26.3.1996 the I.O. recorded the statements of Har­meet Singh, complainant and Onkar Singh. He inspected the spot and prepared site-plan, Ext. Ka-10. He took into possession the motorcycle of deceased from the field of Chaudhary, and the memo, Ext. Ka-8 was prepared by P.C. Verma. On 27.3.1996 he recorded the statements of Swam Singh, Gajendra Singh and arrested accused Ran­jeet Singh, Jaswant Singh and Gurmel Singh. On 30.3.1996 he recovered the trac­tor No. 733 from Atma Singh, father of ac­cused Gurmel Singh and prepared its memo Ext. Ka-6.