BHAGABAT DAS Vs. STATE OF ORISSA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) ORDER :- The petitioner were prosecuted in G.R. Case No. 722 of 1977. Petitioners 1 and 2 were convicted under Ss.323/325/342 IPC and sentenced to undergo R.I. for three months on each count with direction for the sentences to run concurrently. Petitioners 3 and 5 were convicted under S.323 IPC and sentenced to R.I. for fifteen days and petitioners 4 and 6 were convicted under Ss.323/342 IPC and sentenced to R.I. for one month on each count with direction for the sentences to run concurrently. Their appeal preferred against the aforesaid convictions and sentences having failed, they have preferred the present revision.

(2.) The prosecution case as revealed is that on 19-9-77 when P.Ws. 1 and accompanied by P.Ws. 2 and 3 were proceeding towards Jaipur to attend the court of the Executive Magistrate in connection with Criminal Misc. Case No. 224/76 under S.107 Cr. P.C. between P.Ws. 1 and 4 and the petitioners they were ambushed by the petitioners. P.W. 1 while was retreating seeing the assault on P.W. 4, his father, was surrounded by the petitioners restraining his attempt of withdrawal from the scene and was dealt lathi blows. Having been severely beaten P.W. 1 dragged himself to a nearby bush and thereafter swam across a river and reported the matter at the police station. The defence of the petitioners was one of denial with a further plea of the case having been falsely fabricated to entangle them because of the admitted enmity and litigation between the parties. The prosecution case was sought to be established through the evidence of the informant P.W. 1, his father P.W. 4 and the two other witnesses who had accompanied them, P.Ws. 2 and 3, as also the evidence of P.Ws. 5 and 9 who ware the immediate post occurrence witnesses.

(3.) Mr. Mohanty, the learned counsel for the petitioners, in assailing the convictions urged that the very charges against the petitioners were grossly defective being vague and without any description of the particulars of the offences allegedly committed by the petitioners. He also further urged certain aspects in the evidence so as to discredit the prosecution story.