ERWADE SHIVAJI Vs. STATE OF A.P.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The sole accused in S.C. No. 536 of 2009, who has been convicted by the learned Principal Sessions Judge, Adilabad for having killed his wife and sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life, was the appellant in this appeal. Heard Sri S. Surender Reddy, learned counsel for the appellant and the learned Additional Public Prosecutor for the State.

(2.) The theory set up by the prosecution is that the accused and his wife were eking out their livelihood by attending to coolie work in a brick -kiln operated in the fields belonging to the husband of P.W. 2 and the father of P.W. 1. On 23.04.2009 at about 10.00 p.m. the deceased and her husband, the accused with their 2 -year old daughter came to the house of P.W. 2 and wanted to sleep there instead of going back to their hut. Therefore, P.W. 2, as she knew the accused and his wife who were working in the brick -kiln of her husband, given them shelter and also provided them food. When the deceased and accused wanted to sleep in the night there, she also provided a that for them to sleep on. Thereafter, P.Ws. 1 and 2 and two of the neighbours of P.W. 2 and also her daughter went upstairs to sleep. Nearly, after an hours time, they heard a big noise and then they rushed back to the ground floor. P.W. 2 and others have seen the accused in the act of hitting his wife with a boulder in his hand and by then the deceased was struggling for her life as she suffered a bleeding head injury. It is P.W. 1, who questioned the accused for his actions and the accused seem to have bitterly stated that since the deceased was having an extra matrimonial relationship with her relative, he decided to kill her. The panic stricken P.W. 2 sent away P.W. 1 to fetch an elderly male member of the family, a relative of her husband. That is how P.W. 4 came to the house of P.W. 2 in the night and immediately called up for the ambulance as the deceased was found struggling for her life and with a view to save her the ambulance was called. The ambulance appears to have arrived at in the village around 11.00 p.m. It is the case of the prosecution that the staff of the ambulance declared the deceased to have succumbed to the injuries by then and died. It is also the case of the prosecution that after the incident was noticed by P.Ws. 1, 2 and 3, the accused fled away from the scene of offence and also carried away with him the boulder, which he has employed for commissioning the offence.

(3.) Sri S. Surender Reddy, learned counsel for the appellant/accused would urge that no witness has ever spoken of the actual act of the accused killing his wife nor about the motive for the accused to have killed his own wife. This apart, even by the version of P.Ws. 1 and 2, the accused has taken Rs. 500/ - from the husband of P.W. 2 and the father of P.W. 1 in the morning on that day as he was not feeling well and he wanted to go to Nirmal for undergoing a medical examination. Therefore, there was no motive or necessity for the accused to have killed his own wife particularly when they are sleeping in the house of the Master, the husband of P.W. 2. Further, Sri S. Surender Reddy, learned counsel for the appellant/accused would strenuously contend that there are apparent contradictions between the statements made by P.W. 5, father of the deceased and P.W. 7, an independent witness, who has been planted by the police as if it is before P.W. 7 the accused has confessed about the commission of offence. Learned counsel for the appellant/accused has pointed out that P.W. 5, in his deposition has stated that he received phone message at about 02.00 a.m. in the night about the death of his daughter. Therefore, he, his wife and others came to the village, where their daughter died, by about 08.00 a.m. in the morning. He has also stated that by the time he visited the scene of offence, the stone (boulder) used for committing the offence was lying besides the dead body of his daughter. Whereas P.W. 7, a resident of the village, has deposed that it is the next day, the police have sent word for him and also another individual by name Veeramalla Nadipi Poshetty, S/o. Narsimulu to act as Panchas and hence they assembled near the place, where the hut of the accused was lying at the outskirts of the village at about 18.15 hours on 24.04.2009 and it is before these panchas the accused first confessed to the crime and then he also volunteered to produce the boulder used by him for committing the offence. It is the statement of P.W. 7 that the accused has produced the boulder, which he has hidden away by wrapping some clothes around it in his hut and he has produced the said boulder which contained blood marks and thereafter the police have seized it and affixed their signed paper to the said boulder, evidencing its seizure.