KALU KHAN Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an appeal from the judgment of the Additional Sessions Judge, mayurbhanj Balasore, convicting the appellant under Section 201, I. P. C. and sentencing him to four years R. I.

(2.) THE appellant Kalu Khan, who is a resident of village Tikarapara, P. S. Basta, in balasore District, was tried fur an offence under Section 302, I. P. C. for having murdered his son-in-law, Mahommed Khan, on or about the 18th June 1954. The learned Additional Sessions Judge however thought that the evidence on record was not sufficient to prove the charge of murder and he convicted him of the lesser offence under Section 201, I. P. C. , even though no charge under that section was framed, relying on the well known decision of the Privy Council in begu v. Emperor, (AIR 1925, PC 130) (A ).

(3.) IT appears that the appellant and his son-in-law, the deceased Mahommed, khan, were not pulling on well for some years, chiefly because the appellant would not allow his daughter to join her husband. The deceased Mohammed Khan convened several Punchayatis for the purpose of settling this dispute and in one of those Punchayatis he even agreed to construct a house at a site close to the house of the appellant and live there with his wife, that site originally belonged to the appellant who transferred it in favour of his daughter, by a gift deed (Ext. 3) and then the deceased built a house there. But even then he was not allowed to live with his wife. The appellant and his family members shifted to the newly-constructed house of the deceased as his own house was burnt. There is some indication in the evidence that there was a suspicion that it was the deceased who had burnt the house of the appellant. This was said to be one of the main motives for the murder of Mohammed Khan. The last occasion on which he was seen alive was on the 16th June 1934, when P. Ws. 5 and 6 saw him at Basta bazar in the company of his father-in-law, namely, the appellant. Mohammed Khan told these two witnesses that the dispute between him and his father-in-law was going to be settled soon and that he was going to his father-in-law's house for that purpose. For about two days no trace about him was found. ,