NATARAJAN Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) - The appeal is directed against the conviction and sentence passed against the accused (A1), whose case was splitted from that of the other three accused from S. C. No. 231 of 1999, to undergo imprisonment for life and also to pay a fine of Rs. 1,000 in default to undergo rigorous imprisonment for three months in S. C. No: 137 of 2003 on the file of the Additional District and Sessions Judge and Fast Track Court No. 2, Salem.

(2.) THE case of the prosecution was that on 28. 3. 1998 at about 6. 00 p. m. , when the deceased Mathesh was at his house at kuppanoor, the accused (A1) had come with two persons namely Deivam and Srinivasan and had questioned the deceased Mathesh as to why he had asked his junior paternal uncle to pay the fine amount to the panchayat and on an altercation with the said Mathesh. While answering that mathesh replied that the paternal uncle of the accused had paid the fine on his own and the matter was already over. Immediately the accused (Al) had asked two persons namely Deivam and Srinivasan to guard the deceased Mathesh and went to get his junior paternal uncle (Chittappa)Duraisamy to verify the same. After some time, Al had come back with the said duraisamy and the altercation continued and on the instigation of the said Duraisamy the accused (Al) had, with the Koduval in his hand, attacked the deceased Mathesh, on the right shoulder, in front of his house and thereby caused an injury and from the meelee, the said Mathesh ran towards the house of one Ponnusamy; but the accused (Al) had chased him and when Mathesh was about to enter into the house of Ponnusamy, he had attacked him on the back neck of the said Mathesh two times and caused injuries and thereby the said Mathesh died on the spot. The accused (Al) had fled away from the scene of occurrence with the weapon of offence. The lower Court had tried the case in S. C. No: 231 of 1999 against A2 to A4 since the present accused (Al) was absconding then and, after a full fledged trial, the trial Court had acquitted A2 to A4. After securing the present accused, he was tried in S. C. No. 137 of 2003 by the learned additional District and Sessions Judge, salem, who, after appreciating the evidence adduced on the side of the prosecution, had convicted and sentenced the accused appellant herein, to undergo life imprisonment and fine as stated supra.

(3.) LEARNED counsel for the appellant Mr. K. V. Sridharan, would submit in his argument that the lower Court had miserably failed to appreciate the evidence adduced on the side of the prosecution that they were concocted for the purpose of convicting the accused herein and the discrepancies in the prosecution witnesses have not been taken note of by the trial Court, and, therefore, the lower Court had wrongly landed up in ordering conviction and thereby sentenced the accused herein to undergo life imprisonment. He would further submit in his argument that the lower Court had based his conviction upon the interested testimony of pws 1 to 3 who are said to be the eyewitnesses and there is no circumstantial evidence to support the case of the prosecution and however, the evidence of the witnesses who are close relatives of the deceased were absolutely relied upon without any reason whatsoever. He had also submitted further in his argument that the prosecution witnesses did not speak about the presence of the other accused and their respective overt acts and therefore, the presence of others in the scene of occurrence is also doubtful. It is further argued that the alleged occurrence is said to have taken place on 28. 3. 1998 at 6. 00 p. m. and the complaint was said to have been given by PW1 to the Veeranam Police Station on 29. 3. 1998 morning by 3. 50 a. m. and the reasons stated by PW1 is that she had to walk 15 kms. from her place to Veeranam Police Station to give the complaint cannot be sustained and there are buses available to Veeranam from the place and nearby villages upto 10. 30 p. m. whereas the occurrence was said to have been committed by 6. 30 p. m. on that day itself and between the time of occurrence and 10. 30 p. m. , there is no explanation as to what happened to the witnesses and why they did not go by bus to give a complaint. Moreover, it is contended by the learned counsel for the appellant that information could have been given by the witnesses to the police station through the phone available in the said village even though the house of the victim did not have any telephone connection.