PRABAKARAN Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellants in Crl.A.No.826 of 2013 are the Accused Nos.1, 2 and 5 to 7 and the appellant in Crl.A.No.15 of 2014 is the 4th Accused in S.C.No.265 of 2008 on the file of the learned IV Additional Sessions Judge, Ponneri, Tiruvallur District. The trial court framed as many as three charges against the accused. The first charge was under Sec. 148 of Penal Code against A1 and under Sec. 147 of Penal Code as against A2 to A7; the second charge was under Sec. 341 r/w 149 of Penal Code as against A1 to A7; and the third charge was under Sec. 302 of Penal Code as against A1 to A5 and under Sec. 302 r/w 149 of Penal Code as against A6 and A7. The 3rd Accused was one Anthony, son of Munusamy. Since he died during trial, the charges against him stood abated. The trial court, by JUDGEMENT dated 29.11.2013, convicted and sentenced A1, A2 and A4 to A7 for various offences as detailed below:- <IMG>JUDGEMENT_349_LAWS(MAD)3_2016.jpg</IMG> Challenging the same, A1, A2 and A4 to A7 have come up with these criminal appeals.

(2.) The case of the prosecution in brief is as follows:- The deceased in this case was one Subramani. He was a resident of Arani Village, Ponneri Taluk in Tiruvallur District. He was one of the leading personalities in the village. He was responsible, along with few other leaders of the village, for organising the village temple festival every year in the month of October. All these accused also hail from the same village. For quite some time, there was some misunderstanding between two groups of people in respect of the conduct of the said village temple festival. For the year 2006, the deceased and the other leaders were involved in organising the said village temple festival which was scheduled to be celebrated on 21.10.2006. These accused objected to the same. But, the deceased and the others went ahead with the proposal.

(3.) Out of the said witnesses, P.Ws.1 to 13 and 15 are the eye-witnesses to the occurrence. P.Ws.5, 9, 10 and 15 have turned hostile and they have not supported the case of the prosecution in any manner and the rest of the eye witnesses have vividly spoken about the occurrence. They have stated that the accused objected to the procession of the deity and at that time there arose a quarrel between A1 and the deceased, in which, A1 took out a stick and gave a single blow on the head of the deceased. P.W.1 has further stated that he took the deceased to hospital and he has also spoken about the complaint made by him to the police on the next day of occurrence at 08.00 a.m.