YOGI RAM @ YOGI SAH Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) APPELLANT is the informant and father of the deceased. He has preferred this appeal under the provisions of proviso to Section 372 of the Code of Criminal Procedure against the judgment and order dated 31st of July, 2012 passed by the Adhoc Additional Judge, 1st, Buxar in Sessions Trail No.1/09, whereby and whereunder the learned court below has acquitted the respondent nos.2 to 4 from the charges framed against them under Sections 302, 302/34 and 307/34 and Section 27(1) of the Arms Act.

(2.) THE prosecution case in brief is that in the morning of 19.08.2008 at 6.30 p.m. the appellant received information that his four bighas of land on khata no.1, which he had purchased from one Premchand Keshri, was going to be ploughed by the four accused persons by means of a tractor, with the help of 3 -4 other unknown persons. On this information, he along with his sons, namely, the deceased Sarabjeet Kumar Gupta, PW -4 Ajit Kumar Gupta, PW -2 Munna Kumar Gupta, proceeded to his land. When they reached Manikpur canal bridge they saw Ramayan Pandey carrying a licensed gun and Ranjan Pandey and Raju Pandey (respondent no.3) armed with country made pistols. On seeing them informant asked them as to why they were going to plough his field since the land was registered in his name. Upon this Ramayan Pandey gave his gun to Raju Pandey (respondent no.3) and ordered him to kill the informant. Raju Pandey took the gun and fired upon him. Informant somehow saved himself and tried to escape and hide. In the meanwhile, Rajesh Pandey, Ranjan Pandey and Shashi Bhushan Pandey caught hold of his son, Sarvajit Kumar Gupta (deceased) and Raju Pandey put the gun on his head and fired, as a result of which he got badly injured and fell down. Thereafter, Rajesh Pandey and Shashi Bhushan Pandey exhorted to wipe out the entire family of the informant and fired upon his another son. The driver of the tractor, accused Ram Pravesh Paswan (respondent no.3), also came running with a country made shot gun and fired upon them. However, other sons of the informant somehow escaped. Meanwhile, on hearing the firings, people from nearby came running, upon which the accused persons withdrew giving threats. Thereafter, informant came to the place of occurrence and saw that his son Sarabjeet Kumar Gupta was dead. The informant claimed that he could identify the 3 -4 unknown persons also accompanying the accused persons.

(3.) AFTER conclusion of the trial, the Court below heard the arguments and reserved its judgment and finally, by the impugned judgment and order, it acquitted the accused persons of the charges. In the judgment, the learned Trial Court, after noticing the prosecution case, the defence plea and the oral as well as documentary evidence, produced by the parties in the trial, has proceeded to notice the evidence one by one. In paragraph 7 of the judgment, learned Trial Court has noticed in detail the statements made by PW -1 in his evidence. Thereafter, in the same paragraph it has analyzed the evidence of PW -1 and has noticed that it appeared from his evidence that, at the time of alleged occurrence, PW -1 and his other sons were 50 to 100 yards away from the accused persons, whereas the deceased was only 20 to 25 feet away from them (accused persons), towards northern side of the culvert. The accused Raju Pandey had fired upon the informant, but he did not receive any injury, whereas his son (deceased) was caught by the accused persons. The learned Trial Court has found that there was no evidence on record as to whether there was any chase by the accused persons or whether accused persons went nearer the victim or the victim himself moved towards the accused persons. The learned Trial Court has noticed that it was specific case of the prosecution that the deceased was shot at by putting the nozzle of the gun at his temporal region, due to which he fell down and succumbed to his injury and thereafter also, firing was resorted to. The learned Trial Court has noticed that it was apparent that the informant and his family members did not inform the police.