STATE OF RAJASTHAN Vs. ROOP SINGH & OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is State's Appeal against the judgement of the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Sirohi, dated 25-3-70, by which he acquitted the respondents of the charge under section 302 read with 34 I. P. C. for the murder of Mst. Chel Kunwar on the night intervening 11th and 12th June, 1967, in their house in village Si was.

(2.) We have heard arguments of the learned Public Prosecutor and of Shri B. L. Purohit on behalf of the respondents No. 2 and 3. He was also appointed amicus curiae for the rest of the accused.

(3.) The prosecution case in short is that Mst. Chel Kunwar was married four years before her death to accused Roop Singh, it is alleged that Roop Singh's family was displeased with Mst. Chel Kunwar as she failed to bring dowry to the expectations of the family. A day before the occurrence Arjun Singh P.W. 12 who was her distant cousin happened to come to her village on 11.6.67 at about noon time and met Mst. Chel Kunwar. She told him that her husband, his sister and parents have been beating her and had decided to get rid of her. She implored him to take her away but he was unable to do so for want of conveyance. She is alleged to have been killed the same night. One Mst. Dhap Kunwar P.W 7 had seen the dead body and found some nail marks on her neck. She managed to send message to her father. When the message of her death reached her father Narain Singh PW 3 in the village of Bolakuda about 2-3 miles away from Siwas, he despatched Arjun Singh to Siwas. He reached there at about 9-30 a.m. but by then, the funeral pyre had been lit. The participants in the cremation told him that they had seep some ligature marks on her neck and some blood and vomit on her 'odhna'. Thereupon, Arjun Singh proceeded to the Police Station Magar Talao and lodged the First Information Report Ex. P. 4.