SUBA CHAUDHURY Vs. KING

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by five persons, one of whom has been convicted under Section 302, Penal Code, and the others under Section 326/ 149, Penal Code, in connection with a case of rioting which occurred in the afternoon of 13th April 1948, in village Pataili situated within the jurisdiction of Samastipur Police Station and seven miles from the Police station. Appellant 1, Suba Chaudhury, has been convicted under Section 302, Penal Code, and sentenced to transportation for life, and the remaining appellants have been convicted under Section 326/149, Penal Code, and each of them has been sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for a period of eighteen months. Suba and Babu Narayan have further been convicted under Section 148, Penal Code, and the rest under Section 147, but no separate sentence has been passed under these sections.

(2.) The prosecution case was that, when Ram Narayan Chaudhury was getting a bhuskar constructed in the compound of his house at about 3 P. M. on 13th April 1948, Suba Chaudhury turned up, and asked him to stop the construction, Ram Narayan refused to stop the construction, and then Suba went away. But Suba came back within a few minutes with a bhala in one hand and a kudal in the other. He placed the bhala on the ground, and began to demolish the nad there with his kudal, and, when Ram Narayan protested, he kept the kudal on the ground, picked up the bhala, and struck Ram Narayan with it on his chest. The remaining accused, who had arrived at the scene of occurrence by that time, assaulted Ram Narayan with lathis. Ram Narayan had fallen on the ground after receiving the bhala injury, and the bhala blade had got stuck up in his chest, Ganga, a son of Ram Narayan, Dhanraj, a co-villager, and Jhapsi, the servant of Ram Narayan, carried Ram Narayan to the dorokha where the blade was pulled out from the chest. On the hulla raised by Ganga and others, several people including one Manog Chaudhury came to the place of occurrence, Manog rebuked these accused persons for what they had done, and one of them struck him with a bhala on the thigh.

(3.) Ram Narayan was taken to the Samasti-pur Hospital where he was admitted as an indoor patient, and his dying declaration was recorded by a Sub-Deputy Magistrate. The first information report had been recorded by the officer in charge of the Samastipur Police Station on the statement of Ganga Chaudhury made before him at 9-30 P. M. on 13th April 1948. The Sub-Inspector started for the hospital, after recording the first information report; but, before he could reach the hospital, he was informed that Ram Narayan was dead. He then held inquest on the dead body, and sent it for postmortem examination.