SUKUTI ALIAS MASHALI STREE Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Appellant has been convicted under Section 302 Indian Penal Code and sentenced to death. The learned Sessions Judge has made a reference to this Court for confirmation of the sentence of death under Section 376 Code of Criminal Procedure.

(2.) THE prosecution case may be stated in short. The deceased is the son of the accused's husband's elder brother. The accused used to love the deceased like a son, as she herself had only 4 daughters and no son. After the first wife of the deceased died, the accused got him married to p.w. 1 just about 5 months before the date of occurrence. The husband of the accused works as a forest guard at a distant place and used to send money to the accused through money orders. The deceased was either an attester to the receipt of money or used to receive the money on behalf of the accused. The accused carried suspicion that the deceased was misappropriating a portion of the money. She used to have some quarrels with the deceased on this score. On 21 -6 -1968 some time before the evening she challenged the accused as misappropriating the money sent to her by her husband. The deceased got irritated and gave her a slap. She left the place promising dire consequences to the deceased. The houses of the accused and the deceased are just adjacent. The house of p.w. 2 is to the west of the house of the deceased, and the house of p.w. 3 is in front of the house of p.w. 1. The deceased was sleeping on a cot in his Bari while p.w. 1 was sleeping inside a room at a distance of about 3 feet with the door kept open. In between a Dibi light was burning. At about midnight p.w. 1 heard a groaning sound of her husband. She noticed that the accused was cutting the throat of her husband. She shouted. The accused left the place throwing the knife there and ran away towards the forest through the back side of the houses of p.ws. 1 and 2. The alarm raised by her aroused p.ws. 2 and 3. They came to the spot and found the accused running away. They pursued the accused to a distance of about 100 yards raising a hulla, but could not catch her. Some times after, p.w. 4 the daughter of the accused got up by the alarm raised, came to the spot and found the deceased her first cousin lying dead in a pool of blood. She did not find her mother inside her house. She went in search of her and found her sitting on the verandah of one Jaga Master. There the mother confessed to the daughter that she had killed the deceased and cautioned her not to disclose the matter. p.w. 4 came back and slept in the Dhangidi house. The accused went to the house of p.w. 7 some time early morning and confessed to him that she had killed the deceased. p.w. 7 called some of the villagers who tied the accused with a rope and brought her to the place of murder. Next day, that is, on 22 -6 -1968 p.w. 1 in the company of p.ws. 2 and 3 went to the Police Station which is at a distance of 6 Kms. from the place of occurrence, and lodged the F.I.R. (Ext. 3). The entire prosecution story in all vivid details was mentioned in the F.I.R. There was investigation in due course and the accused has been convicted of murder and sentenced to death. The defence was one of complete denial.

(3.) THE next question for consideration is whether the accused killed the deceased. The only eyewitness to the occurrence is p.w. 1, the widow of the deceased. It is to be noted that she has no axe to grind against the accused. In fact it is the accused who was responsible for arranging her marriage with the deceased whom she loved like a son. There is therefore no reason why she would falsely implicate the accused whom she usually addressed as mother, in such a dastardly crime committed near about midnight when everybody was fast asleep. She fully supported the prosecution story as narrated in the F.I.R. and nothing has been elicited in cross -examination to discredit her testimony. The only thing that has been brought out from her is that neither in the F.I.R. nor in her statement under Section 162 Code of Criminal Procedure she had stated that at the time when she made about she named the accused. According to us this is not a material contradiction, hut is a mere omission. Even assuming that it amounts to a material contradiction, it does not in the least affect her evidence that she saw the accused cutting the throat of the deceased with a knife. The Dibi light was at a distance of about 2 feet from the deceased, and from our experience we have no doubt that the deceased and his murderer would be visible to p.w. 1 with the help of the Dibi light. The accused was defended by a counsel, and absolutely no effort was made to put a question to p.w. 1 that the accused would not be visible with the help of the Dibi light. Doubtless the night was dark and cloudy. But all the same there is no reason why we would discard the testimony of p.w. 1 which she assertively makes that she could see the accused cutting the throat of the deceased. The evidence of p.w. 1 by itself is enough to affirm the conviction. She being absolutely disinterested and having no axe to grind, her evidence does not require any corroboration. It is also intrinsically corroborated by the fact that the knife with which the murder was committed was lying near the dead body, and her evidence is that the accused after hearing the hulla from her ran away by throwing the knife there. This knife has been identified to be the knife of the accused by her own daughter p.w. 4. About her intelligence and power of understanding there was critical examination by the learned Sessions Judge which he has noted in the deposition. She was allowed even to be cross -examined by the mother herself. The object of allowing the mother to cross -examine must have been that if the daughter had been tutored, her feelings and sentiments for the mother must be aroused when they were confronted face to face. Despite all these she stood the test of cross -examination and clearly asserted that the knife belonging to her mother was lying near the dead body of the deceased.