BIJENDRA & OTHERS Vs. STATE OF M P

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal under Section 374 of the Code of Criminal Procedure 1974 has been preferred by the accused/appellants having being aggrieved by a judgment dated 13th August 1999 of conviction and sentence delivered in Sessions Case No. 61/1995 by the Fourth Additional Sessions Judge, Morena (M.P.) convicting accused Ramendra Singh and Mahendra Singh for causing murder of Ram Naresh for an offence punishable under Section 302 and 302/34 of I.P.C. and sentencing them to suffer imprisonment for life with a fine of Rs. 12,000/- (Rs. Twelve Thousand Only), each, in default of payment of which to serve three years' more rigorous imprisonment. These accused also stood convicted for offence punishable under Section 324 and 324/34 of I.P.C. and sentenced to suffer two years' rigorous imprisonment with a fine of Rs.1,000/- (Rs. One Thousand Only), each, in default of payment of which to serve three months' rigorous imprisonment on each count. Accused Bijendra Singh was convicted for offence under Section 324 of I.P.C. and sentenced to suffer two years' rigorous imprisonment with a fine Rs.2,000/- (Rs. Two Thousand Only) and in default to serve six months' rigorous imprisonment. By the same judgment, the learned trial court came to acquit other co-accused Ajab Singh, Surendra Singh, Veer Singh and Preetam Singh of charges levelled for offence under Sections 147, 302/149 307/149, 323/149 and 324/149 of I.P.C.

(2.) The facts, in short, just for the adjudication of this appeal are that on 7th June 1994 at about 1 p.m., at the polling booth centre of village Bhojpura Barrade under jurisdiction of Police Station Chinnoni, during the process of casting votes in Panchayat Election, when complainant Hargyan Singh as poling agent of contesting candidate Bhanwar Singh was present and participating in election process by that time accused Bijendra Singh entered inside the booth centre and made quarrel with complainant Hargyan Singh. Thereafter by catching his collar the accused dragged him out of the booth centre where other accused, namely, Preetam Singh having wooden stick (Lathi), Mahendra Singh having countrymade pistol, Surendra Singh having spear, Ramendra Singh having 12 bore gun, Ajab Singh, Munshi Singh and Veer Sing having wooden sticks and Farsas, respectively, in their hands were present from before. It is alleged that accused Bijendra Singh caused injury by Farsa on the head of complainant and after receiving injury he fell down on the earth. By that time, Ram Naresh also reached the spot carrying some voters in a tractor. At that juncture, accused Ramendra fired by his 12 bore gun which hit Ram Naresh who was sitting on the driver seat of the tractor causing injury in his body as a result of which he died on the tractor's seat. Other accused also fired 10-12 shots from their firearms injuring Prayag Singh, Amar Singh, Ram Singh, Janved and Jandel Singh . The motive of the incident was shown previous enmity between accused and the complainant. Complainant then went to police station Kelaras in a tractor and lodged the F.I.R. (Ex.P/17) at the police station, which was 30 kms. away from the place of incident. The F.I.R. was transferred for registration of crime to police station Chinnoni having territorial jurisdiction. The injured were medically examined in the Primary Health Centre Kelaras. The memo of dead body (Ex.P/18) was prepared on the spot and dead body was sent for postmortem to the Primary Health Centre Kelaras by inquest memo Ex.P/1 on the day of incident. On request of the Police Station Chinnoni, postmortem on the body of Ram Naresh was done in the Primary Health Centre Kelaras. After F.I.R. was lodged, spot-map (Ex.P/27) was prepared and other articles relating to incident found on the spot were seized by seizure memo Ex.P/28. After recording the case-diary statements on different days, the accused were arrested and on their surrender, the weapon seized during investigation, were sent for chemical examination to the Director Forensic Science Laboratary, Sagar (M.P.). After investigation, the charge-sheet was filed before the criminal court. On committal, the Sessions trial commenced and after recording the evidence, the present accused-appellants were convicted and sentenced for commission of the alleged offence while other accused were acquitted of the alleged charges, hence this appeal.

(3.) The contention of the learned counsel appearing for appellants is that the judgment under appeal is against the law and procedure and therefore same is liable to be set aside. It is submitted that to prove the guilt against accused, the prosecution examined chance/eyewitnesses, namely, Bhura injured (PW-1), Munna injured (PW-2), Vishambhar Singh (PW-3), Hargyan Singh injured/complainant (PW-5), Kalla injured (PW-6), Shaitan Singh (PW-8), father of the deceased, Prayag Singh injured (PW-9). On medical side, Dr. M.L. Garg (PW-4), Autopsy Surgeon who examined the injured of incident, Dr. K.L. Bandal (PW-7) X-ray in-charge of the District Hospital Morena and Investigators, namely, Tilak Singh (PW-10), Umesh Garg (PW-11) and R.S. Dangi (PW-12) were examined. It is submitted that the prosecution witnesses are interested and related witnesses and had political rivalry so there are every chance of false implication of the accused. Apart from it, the evidence of the witnesses contained material contradictions in relation to the occurrence and is belied by the medical evidence. No independent witness though was available to the prosecution was examined for proving the incident. The trial Judge had committed a grave error in discarding the defence plea. On these submissions, it is prayed that by allowing the appeal, judgment under challenge may be set aside and the accused-appellants be acquitted of the charges framed by the trial court.