SUBHASH Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BY this common judgment, I propose to dispose of two appeals i.e. Criminal Appeal No. 410-SB of 1992 'Subhash v. State of Haryana' and Criminal Appeal No. 45-SB of 1993 'Sudhir v. State of Haryana. Both these appeals are directed against the common judgment and the order of sentence passed by the learned Sessions Judge, Kurukshetra dated 30th April, 1992 and 7th May, 1992 respectively. By virtue of the impugned judgment and the order of sentence, the learned trial Court held the appellant guilty of the offence punishable under Section 304, Part-II of the Indian Penal Code and sentenced each of them to undergo rigorous imprisonment for ten years and to pay a fine of Rs. 1000/- each. In default of payment of fine, to further undergo rigorous imprisonment for a period of three months. Needless to say that there were four other accused namely Dalip, Ramesh, Surinder and Rajan, they were held not guilty and acquitted of the charges framed against them.

(2.) JOGINDER deceased alongwith his brother Rajinder and his wife Kanchan were living at Gandhi Nagar, Kurukshetra. They were all working as labourer alongwith certain other persons which included Kamleshwari and others. The work for construction was going on at Akashwani, Kurukshetra. There were two contractors namely Khosla and Billa. Rajinder, Joginder, Kamleshwari and Kanchan worked with contractor Khosla. The appellant and other worked with contractor Billa. On 15th January, 1990, at about 2.00 P.M. Kanchan alongwith her husband, deceased Joginder, Raghbir, Prem Kumar and Lachhmi were having their lunch. Deceased Joginder went to the water tap for drinking the water and also to fetch some water for others. Dalip stopped Joginder from taking water on the pretext as they were using the water to make the walls wet and he told Joginder to take the water from the other tap. However, Joginder started drinking water forcibly. Joginder and Dalip grappled with each other. Dalip shouted to give beating to Joginder. In the meantime, Sudhir armed with iron pipe, Subhash armed with iron rod and Ramesh armed with lathi alongwith others came to the spot. All of them started assaulting Joginder. Sudhir gave a blow with iron pipe to Joginder which hit him on his head. Subhash gave an iron rod blow to Joginder which hit him on his nose. Ramesh gave a lathi blow on the left foot, while Surinder and Rajan caused injuries to Joginder on his chest with brickbats.

(3.) JOGINDER was removed to L.N.J.P., Hospital, Kurukshetra, and was medico-legally examined. Keeping in view his condition, the patient was referred to Post Graduate Institute at Chandigarh. It appears that the condition of Joginder became serious and he was taken to Mission Hospital, Ambala City where he breathed his last. Dr. Kuldip Kumar, Medical Officer, Community Health Centre, Maharpur, conducted the post-mortem on the mortal remains of Joginder. In the opinion of Dr. Kuldip Kumar, the cause of death was due to injury to the brain which was sufficient to cause death in the ordinary course of nature.