SOBHA RAM Vs. KASHMIRI LAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The facts giving rise to this revision petition are as follows: A case under Section 376, I.P.C. and Section 511 and Section 342, I.P.C. was registered, at police station Totu against Kashmiri Lal accused. After taking the prosecution evidence the Magistrate decided to charge the accused under Section 354, I.P.C, On the conclusion of the case Kashmiri Lal was convicted under the same section and was ordered to pay a fine of Rs. 200/- or in default to undergo two months' simple imprisonment. On appeal, the learned Sessions Judge set aside Kashmiri Lal's conviction. Sobha Ram has now come to this Court on the revision side with the prayer that the order of the Sessions Judge acquitting Kashmiri Lal of the offence for which he had been convicted by the trial Magistrate be set aside and the appeal be sent back for fresh decision.

(2.) It is in the evidence that Sobha Ram was a tenant of Kashmiri Lal and the houses of the two were quite near each other. In fact only another house intervened between them. On 25-3-1950 Mst. Maya Devi, minor daughter of Sobha Ram was accosted by the accused while she was returning home from her school and was asked to bring an eye medicine for. him from her mother. Maya Devi went home and informed her parents that the, accused wanted a medicine; Ram Devi mother of. Maya Devi, was unable' to find the medicine at that time and accordingly sent her other daughter to call the servant so that he might be asked if he knew anything of the medicine. After the girl had gone Mt.' Ram Devi was able to and the medicine and sent Maya Devi with it to the accused's house. The story proceeds that when Maya Devi handed the medicine to the accused he asked her to accompany him to the house and when they were both inside the 'baithak' the accused shut the doors and chained it froml inside. Then he removed the 'salver' of the girl and himself became naked before her. The girl got terrified at the sight of the accused's male organ in erection and started shrieking her outcries attracted to the scene her parents and later on a number of other persons and when they peeped through the glass panes of a window they saw the girl sitting on a table without her salver and. the accused trying to put on his payjama. Sobha Ram, kicked at the door and was about to force it open when the accused came out. Sobha Ram took the girl to his house; the accused also followed them and apologised for the wrong that he had done and asked to be forgiven; Later on Sobha Ram took a train to Kandaghat with Mt. MayaDevi and reported the matter to the District Magistrate who asked him to make a written complaint. Sobha Ram presented a written complaint to the District Magistrate next morning who forwarded it to the Asst. Superintendent of Police Kandaghat for investigation. The Assistant Superintendent of Police went to Totu accompanied by Sobha Ram and his daughter and lodged the first information report.

(3.) The principal witness in the case was Mt. Maya Devi who gave her age as 7 or 8 years. Her parents Sobha Ram and Ram Devi corroborated her testimony. The other witnesses in the case were Paras Ram, Sobha Ram's servant, Mt. Santi, Sardar Balwant Singh, District Magistrate and A.S.L. Magher Singh who investigated the case.