HARDEV SINGH AND ANR. Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Petitioners/accused, Hardev Singh and Gursharan Singh, were convicted for the offences under Sections 332, 353, 506 and 186 read with Section 34 IPC by the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Fatehgarh Sahib, vide judgment dated 12.01.2002 and were sentenced as under:

(2.) FACTS , in brief, are that there was a sanctioned watercourse in the land of the accused, which was dismantled by them and an order was passed in case No. 4 of 1996 by the Superintendent Engineer, Canal Department, Patiala, for the restoration of that water course. The officials of the Canal Department went to the spot for restoration of the watercourse, but were not allowed to do so by the accused. Thereafter, the orders were obtained from District Magistrate, Fatehgarh Sahib, for restoring the watercourse with the help of police force. Bhupinder Singh Patwari P.W. 3, Gurnam Singh Ziledar P.W. 8, accompanied by Jawala Singh Lambardar, Surjit Singh Panch, Makhan Singh Lambardar, Rajinder Singh, Gurdev Singh, Mewa Singh, Avtar Singh and Manmohan Singh, went to the land of the accused on 21.10.1996 at about 10.30 a.m. At that time, Bir Singh accused, with his two sons; namely, Hardev Singh and Gursharan Singh, was also present. They were made aware of the orders passed by the District Magistrate and the restoration of the watercourse. They were asked if there was any stay order in their favour but they failed to produce any such order. When the proceedings were started for restoring the watercourse, the accused started abusing and threatened Patwari and Ziledar. Gursharan Singh started his tractor make of HMY -3511, bearing registration No. PJV -4114, and tried to run over the Patwari, who tried to save himself by running and in the process fell down. That accused passed over the right side rear wheel of the tractor over his knee. That accused again tried to run over him by reversing the tractor but the back wheel thereof broke down. That accused was over powered by the police force. About this occurrence, Patwari made his statement P.W. 3/A before Sadha Singh, ASI and on the basis thereof FIR Ex. P -7/B was recorded against the accused. Bhupinder Singh Patwari was medico legally examined by Dr. Bhushan Malhotra P.W. 2, who found one injury on his person, which was described in the MLR report Ex. P.W. 2/A. In the course of investigation, the other accused were arrested, relevant documents were taken into possession and statements of witnesses were recorded. After completion of the investigation, the challan was put in before Chief Judicial Magistrate, who found sufficient grounds for presuming that that the accused committed the aforesaid offences. They were charged accordingly, to which they pleaded not guilty and claimed trial. To prove the guilt of the accused, prosecution examined Surjit Singh P.W. 1, Dr. Bhushan Malhotra P.W. 2, Bhupinder Singh P.W. 3, Lakhwinder Singh P.W. 4, C Daswinder Singh P.W. 5, Paramjit Singh, Ahlmad P.W. 6, ASI Sadha Singh P.W. 7 and Gurnam Singh Ziledar P.W. 8.

(3.) THE charge was re -framed against Hardev Singh and Gursharan Singh accused by learned Chief Judicial Magistrate on 11.01.2002 on the ground that the offence under Section 323 IPC stood covered by the offence under Section 332 IPC. Those accused did not plead guilty and the Court proceeded with the trial by observing in the order that only the offence under Section 323/34 IPC had been deleted and no fresh charges have been framed and there was no need to re -examine the witnesses. After going through the evidence so produced on the record and hearing the Assistant P.P. for the State and learned Counsel for the accused, the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate convicted and sentenced the accused, as aforesaid.