RAJENDRA PASWAN Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THERE are two appellants in the present appeal who were tried by the learned Ist Additional Sessions Judge, Gaya in Sessions Trial No. 427 of 1986 / 29 of 1988 for a composite charge under sections 302/34 of the IPC along with three other accused persons. The learned Judge delivered his verdict on 22nd July, 1994 and while acquitting accused Jogia Paswan, Barat Mahto and Idrish Mian of the charge framed against them, held the two appellants guilty of committingoffence under sections 302/34 of the IPC.

(2.) THE appellants were heard on sentence on 25.7.1994 and each ofthem was directed to suffer rigorous imprisonment for life for havingcommitted the above offence. THE appellants have brought into questiontheir conviction as recorded by the learned judge.

(3.) THE prosecution examined a total of nine witnesses in support ofthe charge. P.W. 1 Nanku Paswan is a witness who has stated aboutseeing the deceased at the house of the appellants and again not findinghim on the date of occurrence at about 4 P.M. P.W. 2 was declaredhostile. P.W. 3 Raj Kishore Prasad is a witness to the inquest report.P.W. 4, Bisun Choudhary was again declared hostile on account of notsupporting the prosecution case. P.W. 5 Nand Lal Prasad was the fatherof the deceased and he has stated that his son Deepak Kumar left his house and was seen at the house of the appellants and that the dead bodywas recovered in his presence. He also produced a letter which wasallegedly recovered by P.W. 9 from the house of appellant RajendraPaswan which has been marked Ext. 3. P.W. 6 Dr. Kapildeo Prasad hadheld postmortem examination on the dead body of Deepak and hadprepared the report, Ext. 4. P.W. 7, as already stated, is the informant ofthe case. P.W. 8 Ram Kumar Prasad Sharma was an employee of Magadh Grameen Bank and he produced specimen signature kept in thebranch of the deceased for comparison with the writings of Ext. 3. P.W.9, as just pointed out, was the I.O. of the case.