STATE OF JAMMU AND KASHMIR Vs. HEM RAJ

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This acquittal appeal is directed against the judgment and order of the learned Sessions Judge, Rajouri, dated 18-6-1984 whereby accused has been acquitted of the charge against him for offence under Section 302, R.P.C.

(2.) Briefly the prosecution story is that on 14-10-1983, Mohan Singh and Mela Ram chowkidar reported to the police that a dead body incapable of identification was lying on the roadside of village Borari. A police party led by the SHO visited the spot and the dead body was finally identified to be of Om Parkash by his mother and other relations. The dead body was sent for postmortem and on 3-1-1984 the cause of death was finally ascertained to be violent asphyxia because of the presence of injuries on the head and neck of the deceased.

(3.) From 14-10-1983 till 5-12-1983 proceedings under Section 174, Cr.P.C. were continued and it was on 5-12-1983 that a formal case under Section 302, R.P.C. was registered on the basis of the injury statement as no opinion about the cause of death had been received by them. During the trial it has come in the evidence that the deceased Om Prakash along with accused and many others was last seen together in the house of Mohan Singh PW 14 where all the prosecution witnesses 1 to 8 and 15 had collected to take liquor on the evening of 11-10-1983. At about 10 p.m. accused and deceased left along with Behari Lal and Kasturi Lal PWs 1 and 2. Both the accused and the deceased are alleged to have had some altercation and since the deceased was dead drunk and unable to hold himself, accused tried to drag him from the neck as a result of which he fell in a ditch but the accused helped him out of it. This was witnessed by PWs 1 and 2. Nothing was heard of the deceased on 12/13 Oct. while his dead body was found only on 14-10-1983. On the basis of such evidence the prosecution came to the conclusion that the deceased was killed by the accused as the former had illicit relations with the sister-in-law of the latter to which he had objected which, according to the prosecution was the motive for the commission of murder of the deceased who was the husband of his real sister.