EMPEROR Vs. KANGAL MALI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The accused Kangal Mali, a boatman, is charged with the murder, on the evening of the 13th December 1904, of one Mahabir who had left a place named Kalachera on the day previous by boat for Sealtek Bazar on the Barak river. The majority of the jury have returned a verdict of not guilty. One juryman, however, and the Sessions Judge are of opinion that the accused is guilty of the offence with which he has been charged.

(2.) The Sessions Judge has, therefore, referred the case to this Court.

(3.) The facts as to which there is practically no doubt are these. The deceased Mahabir, a trader at Kalachera, had in his employ a boatman, named Labhan. The latter fell ill and sent as his substitute his brother, the accused, who is a young man of about 25 years of age. The deceased was both an older man and, according to the evidence given by his brother-in-law, a strong stout man, a man of greater strength than the accused. Mahabir intended to go to Sealtek Bazar to buy goods for his shop. He left Kalachera with the accused, no one else being in their company, on the afternoon or evening of Monday the 12th of December 1904. The boat in which they went was a 35-maund boat, about 18 or 19 cubits long and about 4 cubits wide.