VIRENDRA Vs. STATE OF U P

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Virendra, appellant has preferred this appeal against the judgment and order dated 30-9-77 passed by Sessions Judge, Farrukhabad whereby the learned Sessions Judge has convicted the appellant under section 302 IPC and sentenced him to imprisonment for life.

(2.) The facts of the prosecution case are that the complainant Mewa Ram (P.W 1), his brother Ram Prakash (deceased) as well as Virendra, appellant belonged to the same village Nagla Latifpura, hamlet of village Sikandarpur, p. 5 Shamshabad, District Farrukhabad The houses of the deceased and the appellant are adjacent. Apart from the houses of the complainant and the deceased there are houses of one Munshi, Lal Sahai and other persons. It is alleged that Virendra, appellant used to visit the house of Munshi surreptitiously for illicit purposes through the roof of the house of Ram Prakash, deceased, who did not like that conduct and consequently had forbidden the appellant from doing so. It is said that on 16-4-76 Ram Prakash Was sleeping on his cot on the roof of his house, Virendra appellant again scaled over the roof of Ram Prakash at about 3 a.m. to go to the house of Munshi to which Ram Prakash again protested. The row between Ram Prakash and the appellant drew attention of Mewa Ram (P.W. 1), Ram Singh (P.W. 2), Soney Lal (P.W. 5) and other persons sleeping on their adjoining roof. It was moonlit night and there were torches of the witnesses and neighbours. In these light they saw that Virendra, appellant took out pistol from his Phenta (folds of his dhoti) and fired at Ram Prakash with it. Wounded Ram Prakash fell down from the roof into his court-yard and died due to the aforesaid gunshot injuries. On being challenged by the witnesses the appellant reloaded his pistol, jumped into his courty-yard, fired a shot in the air and ran out of his house towards south. Thereafter Mewa Ram got a report Ext. Ka-1 scribed by one Lal Ram and lodged it at 4.15 a.m. on the same day i.e. 16-5-76 at Police Station Shamshabad situate at a distance of 4 miles from the place of occurrence. The case was registered against the appellant under section 302 I.P.C. The matter was entrusted to S.I. Radhey Shy am (P.W. 6) for investigation. He reached the place of occurrence at about 6 a.m. He prepared inquest report and sent the dead body for post-mortem through constable Beni Prasad and Chowkidar Rameshwar Prasad. He found the shell of rifle cartridge Ext. 3 on the roof of the house of Ram Prakash, which he sealed in a packet and prepared its recovery memo (Ext. Ka-11) in the presence of the witnesses. He prepared a site plan (Ext. Ka-13).

(3.) Dr. R.P. Gupta (P.W. 3) conducted the post-mortem examination of the dead body of Ram Prakash on 17-5-76 at 1.30 p.m. and found the following ante-mortem injury: One gun-shot wound of entry 1 x 1 abdominal cavity deep, on the right side of the abdomen 3 of the above the unbilicus at 10 clock position. Blackening and charring present. Direction from right to left and from front to back. He also found one rifle bullet inside the abdomen. In the opinion of the Doctor the death was caused due to aforesaid injury which could have caused on 16-5-76 at about 3 a.m.T1.