LAWS(MAD)-1987-8-42

SOUNDARARAJAN Vs. SUBRAMANI

Decided On August 14, 1987
SOUNDARARAJAN Appellant
V/S
SUBRAMANI Respondents

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This petition coming on for hearing on 31st day of July, 1987, upon perusing the petition, and the judgment of the Lower Courts, and the record in the case and upon hearing the arguments of Mr. R.S. Jeevarathnam, Advocate for the petitioner and of Mr. C. Rajan, Advocate for the 1st respondent and of Miss P.G. Thamaraiselvi, for the Public Prosecutor, on behalf of the State, and the case having stood over for consideration till this day, the Court made the following order:

(2.) The jurisdiction of this Court while dealing with revision petition against an order of acquittal is very limited. The Supreme Court has delimited the limits of jurisdiction of this Court in several decisions, the most important of which are Chinnaswamy v. State of Andhra Pradesh Mahendra Pratap Singh v. Sargu Singh and Akalu Ahir v. Ram Deo Ram. The General principle is that for setting an order of acquittal in revision there should have been a gross miscarriage of justice. I shall find out whether, as urged by the learned counsel for the revision petitioner, this is one of those exceptional case.

(3.) The Assistant Sessions Judge, Tiruvallur, has thrown out the entire case of the prosecution for the reason that the events should have been witnessed by of her persons as well and the absence of emanation of those persons would throw considerable doubt on the case of the prosecution. This obviously was a very wrong approach. The case of the prosecution can be thrown of the persons in whose exclusive knowledge the relevant fact resides have not been examined. But when a fact has been witnessed by several persons, it is open to the prosecution to examine only some of them: It is for the Judge to decide whether the witnesses arrayed by the prosecution are competent and trustworthy and whether their testimony is adequate and finds corroboration with other spheres of the evidence adduced by the prosecution and to a conclusion. In throwing the entire case for the sole reason that other witnesses who could have witnessed the fact are not examined whilst the victim who has sustained two grievous injuries and who gave a complaint and another eye-witness have been examined, without giving any reason for not believing their evidence or finding their evidence inadequate, the Judge committed a gross miscarriage of justice. The Judge has evaded his duty to give a finding on the evidence on record.