PUBLIC PROSECUTOR Vs. SEMALAI PANNADI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal is preferred by the State against the acquittal of Semalai Pannadi (accused 1), for an offence under S. 302 I.P.C. by the learned Sessions Judge, Coimbatore, in S.C. No. 142 of 1958. He was convicted under S. 304 (Part II) and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for five years. But he has not preferred an appeal against the said conviction and sentence. The State also appeals against the acquittal of accused 2.

(2.) The case against accused 1 was: the deceased Kanda Pannadi was a ryot cultivating Naduvakadu on lease from one Murugana Goundan. To the west of this land is the land of Ramana Goundan called Parambukorai. The accused Semalai Pannadi was the Tannirkatti of the deceased Kanada Pannadi till Chitrai last year when his services were dispensed with. Thereafter he became the Thannirkatti of Rama Goundan. These lands were irrigated with the water of Puthuvaikal. This water was diverted to these lands by Koppus. Parambukorai of Ramana Goundan in irrigated through the southern koppu and the land of the deceased through the middle koppu. It is the case both for the prosecution as well as the accused that on 15-6-1958 transplantation was going on in Parambukorai, supervised by the Thannirkatti accused. The deceased, when he came to the field in the morning found that there was overflow of water into Parambukorai and there was no water flowing into his land. The water was flowing into Parambukorai through the legitimate southern koppu. The deceased therefore went to the southern koppu and blocked it in order to divert the water into the middle koppu from the Puthuvaikal. The accused removed the block. In fact the deceased was closing and the accused was removing the block for about ten minutes and there was an exchange of hot and absence words. The accused had a spade in his hand and he hit the deceased on his head with the wooden portion of the spade. The deceased fell down into the koppu. P.W. 1 who had accompanied Kanda Pannadi, raised an alarm and tried to interfere and sustained an injury. The accused left the place with his spade westwards. P.W. 3, the Thannirkatti of a neighbouring land, witnessed this. The alarm raised by P.W. 1 brought to the scene P.W. 2 and some women including P.W. 7 who were working in the vicinity. P.W. 1 and others lifted the deceased and laid him on the ridge and administered some cold rice water to him. On P.W. 1's information Palani Panadi (P.W. 8), the eldest brother of the deceased, came there. The deceased was taken in a cart to Gobichettipalayam police station. There he gave a report to the head constable P.W. 6, implicating this accused as his assailant. He was sent to the hospital. The doctor P.W. 5 got his dying declaration recorded by the Sub Magistrate P.W. 4. In that statement Kanda Pannadi implicated this accused as his assailant. Kanda Pannadi died in the hospital on 21-6-1958 at 4 a. m.

(3.) The case for the accused was: "Kanda Pannadi blocked the flow of water at the pali and we exchanged words for sometime. He closed the pali and I opened it. There is a place there about, chest high. He pushed me and I pushed him. He was standing on the raised portion and I was standing on the lower portion. I pulled his hands after he pulled me. Then he fell down on the cement construction and sustained an injury on the head. He got up and went. I went southwards to my land to attend to my work. Kanda Pannadi went away walking."