KARLUS KANAI Vs. STATE OF MEGHALAYA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant questions the propriety of the impugned judgment of conviction of August 10, 2021 under Sec. 302 of the Penal Code and the entence passed on the same day imposing life imprisonment.

(2.) Several grounds have been urged on behalf of the appellant. For a start, the appellant says that the entire investigation was faulty since the investigating officer in this case was an Assistant Sub-Inspector who assumed authority as the investigating officer without being conferred the same. The appellant submits that as a general rule, in terms of Rule 36 in Part V of the Assam Police Manual, which applies to the State by virtue of a notification of July 9, 2015, the Assistant Sub-Inspector could not have acted as the investigating officer. Indeed, the appellant says that the manner in which the investigation was conducted, certain observations were recorded by the investigating officer and, ultimately, his testimony in court would demonstrate that key aspects were ignored that led to a complete miscarriage of justice. The appellant points out that though a murder weapon was supposed to have been recovered from the garden outside the house of the appellant, allegedly at the appellant's prompting, the purported murder weapon was not shown to the eye-witnesses. It is the further contention of the appellant that one of the eye-witnesses testified that the appellant had thrown the murder weapon at the place of occurrence before fleeing therefrom; and, in such circumstances, there was no question of recovering the murder weapon from the garden next to the appellant's residence. Other discrepancies as to the dates of forwarding the appellant for police custody and re-forwarding him are also pointed out.

(3.) As to the testimonies of the three eye-witnesses, the appellant says that none of them referred to the appellant stabbing the victim or committing the offence with which he was charged. The appellant also brings out the anomalies in the first information report and the oral evidence in course of the trial of the maker of such report and the person who is alleged to have informed such maker of the incident.