GOVIND JANABHA KUMBHAR Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS appeal is directed against the conviction of appellant No.1 for the offence punishable under Section 3(1)(x) of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 (for short, "the SCST Act"), Section 7(1)(d) of the Protection of Civil Rights Act and Sections 353 and 506 of the Indian Penal Code (for short, "the IPC") as also conviction of appellant Nos.2 and 3 for the offences punishable under Section 506 of the IPC. The appellants have been sentenced to various terms of imprisonment and fine by the learned Special Judge, Kolhapur upon conclusion of trial of Special Case No.9 of 1996 before him.

(2.) ' The facts which are material for deciding this appeal are as under:

(3.) ' All the same, with the help of both the learned counsel for the appellants and the learned APP, I have gone through the evidence tendered to find out whether the learned Special Judge was justified in holding the appellants guilty of the offending acts. When an offence is made up of only verbal tirade, a a Judge would have to bear in mind that such an allegation could be easily made and therefore would have to ensure that there is sufficient corroboration. In this case, the learned counsel for the appellant may be right in submitting that since the incident itself was imaginary, only two witnesses who were examined, came with different stories. The first informant Narayan was examined as PW-4 and his wife Gangu was examined as PW-6. While Narayan was emphatic that they were returning after the treatment of his wife, his wife Gangu stated that they were returning because the doctor was not available. The learned APP submitted that this discrepancy is irrelevant since it pertains to something which happened before the incident. This contention has to be rejected, since both the husband and wife had stated about the cause of their being at the spot at the relevant time and both diferred as to whether their aim of getting treatment for Gangu had been accomplished or not.