SAWALIA SINGH Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) ALTOGETHER 12 accused persons were prosecuted for various charges, but since Bhola Singh died, only 11 accused persons could be put on trial who suffered conviction on various counts on being tried by Sri Krishna Mohan Srivastava, 3rd Assistant Sessions Judge, Chapra, in ST. No. 92 of 1979. Those who suffered conviction under Section 307/149 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and were sentenced to suffer rigorous imprisonment for a term of five years, were Rudal Singh, Sawalia Singh, Ajay Singh, Kamla Singh, Vijay Singh, Ram Pukar Singh, Dharamjit Singh, Bharat Singh, Algoo Singh, Bageshwar Singh and Parmeshwar Singh. Bijay Kumar Singh suffered conviction also under Section 326 IPC and was sentenced to suffer rigorous imprisonment for a term of three years. Those who suffered conviction under Section 148 IPC and were sentenced to suffer rigorous imprisonment for a term of one year each, were Rudal Singh, Sawalia Singh, Ajay Singh, Kamla Singh and Bijay Singh. Pukar Singh, Dharamjit Singh, Bharat Singh, Alago Singh, Bageshwar Singh and Parmeshwar Singh suffered conviction also under Section 147 IPC and were sentenced to suffer rigorous imprisonment for a term of six months with direction that in case of these convicts, sentences shall run concurrently.

(2.) ALL these convicts preferred Cr. Appeal No. 98 of 1986. However, during pendency of the appeal, since convict Rudal Singh and Ram Pukar Singh died, appeal as against them abated. In case of rest nine Appellants, while upholding their conviction under Section 307/149 IPC, the appellate court reduced their sentence to a term of four years. In case of convict Bijay Kumar Singh, while upholding his conviction under Section 326 IPC. sentence was reduced to a term of two years and with these modifications in the sentence only, the appeal was dismissed.

(3.) SUBMISSIONS were made at Bar that the evidences of even injured witnesses bristles with major contradictions which did not inspire confidence in them, and that apart, while placing reliance on Exhibit A, it was urged that neither the trial court nor the appellate court had taken into consideration the fact that a complaint case with regard to said occurrence had been filed by Ajay Singh, one of the Petitioners, and in that backdrop, there was hardly good reasoning to uphold the allegations attributed to the Petitioners. In quick succession, it is urged that on the Petitioners ' side, two persons suffered injuries on their persons, which would be explicit from the positive finding recorded by D.W. 2 who happens to be a doctor who clinically examined them, and since the prosecution has failed to explain the injury on the person of the accused persons, prosecution case had to be disbelieved in entirety and narrations made by the witnesses on this score had to be thrown over board. The Petitioners having suffered mental agony for more than 24 years for their protracted prosecution was also taken to be a ground in this revision.