JAYANATH CRAM Vs. STATE OF ORISSA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal is against the order of conviction and sentence passed by the learned Sessions Judge. Sundargarh in S.T. No. 95 of 1989 under Section 302, IPC directing the appellant to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life.

(2.) The prosecution case as unfolded during trial, is as follows P.W.1, the son of the deceased lodged an information at the Sundargarh Sadar Police Station by stating that on 8-2-1989 in the evening at about 7.00 P.M. the informant (P.W.1) and his younger brother (P.W.3) had set out for village Chengbernapara to attend a marriage function of one of their relations. At the time when they went out from the house, they had noticed the appellant in the company of their mother, the deceased. In the night they did not return. On the following morning when both the brothers returned they found that their front door had been locked and the keys had been placed on the wall. P.W. 1 opened the lock, entered inside the house and noticed that the door of the inside room was locked outside with a rope being tied. The informant untied the rope, entered inside the room and saw his mother, lying in a pool of blood in their kitchen close to the fire place and she was dead. The informant raised an outcry, as a result of which P.W. 3 went inside. P.W.1 asked his brother to watch the dead body and went out to call the other persons of the village. P.Ws. 1 and 3 also found a hammer lying inside the ban stained with blood. The lungi, napkin and other clothes used by the appellant were also stained with blood, but the appellant had changed those blood stained clothes, kept them inside, and left the house. It is further stated in the FIR that by the time P.Ws. 1 and 3 reached their house, they found the appellant absent. The appellant was quite often consuming liquor and not contributing any financial help to the family. On the basis of the report, a case under Section 302, IPC was registered against the appellant and the O.I.C., Sadar Police Station. Immediately took up investigation, in course of which he proceeded to the spot, held inquest over the dead body of the deceased, arranged to send the dead body for post mortem examination, seized the weapon of offence, the hammer (M.O.I) and the clothes of the deceased as well as the appellant and on completion of investigation, submitted charge-sheet against the appellant.

(3.) The defence plea in the trial Court was that on 8-9-1989 the appellant was not in the village and on 1/2/1989 he had visited his sisters house coming to know that she was unwell and had stayed there for 7-8 days. As he was working in the O.S. R.T.C. garage, Sundargarh he had handed over the application for leave to one of his friends.