BACHULA PEDA SOMADU Vs. KING-EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Taking Criminal Appeal No. 40 first, in this case 8 of the 24 accused were convicted by the acting Sessions Judge of Goodavari division, as to accused 2 and 4 to 8 under Section 147, as to accused 1 under Secs.326, 324 and 148 and as to accused 3 under Secs.324 and 148. The riot in which these persons are held to have taken part was a fight between the Panchamas of Voolapalli and the Panchamas of Biccavole, a village close by, and it took place about midday on 12 April 1922 at the boundary between the two villages. The story of the beginning of the fight is told by P.W. 2, whose credibility there is not the least reason to doubt. He is an Inspector of Co-operative Societies and, when on tour from Biccavole on the day in question, 9 accused told him that the Biccavole and Voolapalli Panchamas had quarrels and that the Voolapalli people were going to Biccavole to settle the quarrel. It appears that some Voolapalli men had married Biccavole wives and had refused to fetch them away to their houses. P.W. 2 was asked to mediate. He agreed, but thought it would be better if he had some support and went to fetch the schoolmaster, P.W. 9. He left the two parties of Panchamas, one on each side of the boundary. There was a panchayat formed, but according to the evidence of P.W. 2 a Biccavole man whistled and this was a signal for a general fight between the two factions. P.W. 2, seeing a fight was imminent, went away. He says there were about 70 of the Voolapalli people and about 30 or 40 of the Biccavole people. He saw no weapons in the hands of either party. P.W. 9 does not give any useful evidence as he. seeing the two factions sitting opposite each other on the boundary, apprehended that there would be a fight and ran away. That there was a fight cannot be disputed. The learned Sessions Judge held that accused 1 and 3 were the leaders of the Voolapalli party and that the fight was entirely due to their action.

(2.) The other case, Criminal Appeal No. 39, is a case in which certain members of the Biccavole party, accused 1, 3,10,11 and 22 there have been convicted, as to accused 1 and 3 under Secs.148 and 324 and as to accused 10, 11 and 22 under Section 147. The accused in case No. 39 are most of the witnesses in the other case, Criminal Appeal No. 40. Mr. Lakshmanna who appeared for the accused in criminal appeal No. 39 pleaded self-defence largely, I think, on the ground that the learned Sessions Judge, possibly rather inaccurately, says "there is a certain element of self-defence to be considered," though he adds that the doctrine is not, in a rioting case, to be discussed when the question is whether a man is guilty or innocent of the offence of rioting. It is admitted that there is no evidence of self-defence on the record. The statements of the prosecution witnesses in Criminal Appeal No. 40 were relied on but were not put in at the trial. It does not seem to me that the defence of self-defence which must be specific and individual in every case can be relied on here where there is good evidence to hold that there was a general fight between these two parties. The plea in 39 is that the Biccavole party went to the panchayat peacefully and they got the worst of it and that the Voolapalli party were the aggressors. There is no evidence of this whatever. In fact what little evidence there is (of P.W. 2) seems to show that the Biccavole party who are the accused in 39 began the fight as one of their numbers sounded a whistle which was the signal for the general engagement.

(3.) The case would present no subject of interest were it not for the fact that the witnesses in both the cases partly resiled in the Sessions Court from their statements made before the committing Magistrate. For instance, to take one example from the record in Criminal Appeal No. 40, P.W. 4 before the committing Magistrate's Court distinctly stated that the first accused cut him on his right wrist with a sword stick. Third accused with a sword stick hit him en the shoulder, seventh accused hit him with a stick on his back. In the Sessions Court he admits there was a fight and that he was injured on his right wrist and that it was caused with a knife, but he could not say who gave him the blow. He says the police forced him to tell the Magistrate that the seventh accused hit him on the back with a stick, and that he did not see the first accused strike anybody. To take another example, P.W. 5 in the Magistrate's Court says that the first accused stabbed him with a knife on his left palm. In the Sessions Court he said he received a knife cut on the palm of his left hand. He did not notice who gave him the blow. When he was examined by the committing Magistrate he says he was confused. P.W. 6 says there was a fight, but he does not know how it arose and that some one gave him a blow on the back with a knife. Before the committing Magistrate ho said that the first accused chased him and cut him with a knife on the back. In the Sessions Court he said that the police compelled him to implicate some one and that was why he said that the accused had struck him on the back with a knife. P.W. 7 said in the Sessions Court he received no injuries that day and that he went to the hospital to get the wound attended to, which is obviously false (of. Exhibit G). P.W. 8 said in the Sessions Court that he received three injuries of which two were caused with a knife and the other with a stick. He cannot say who struck him. In the committing Magistrate's Court he said the accused 1, 7 and 6 hit him with knives. He also says that the police frightened him. The same unwillingness in the Sessions Court to name the man who injured each witness is to be observed in Criminal Appeal No. 39. It will be tedious to go through the whole of the depositions, but from what I have quoted above it will be gathered that the witnesses on the whole admit there was a fight. Most of them admit they were injured but when it comes to naming the person who injured them they say they do not know. There is in my opinion ground for thinking that these two villagers have now composed their quarrel and that it was a condition of the settlement that none of them should inculpate the other when it came to the trial. On the best consideration that I can give to the facts of the case it appears to us that the Sessions Judge was perfectly justified, subject to what will be said hereafter, in relying on the statements before the committing Magistrate under Section 288, Criminal Procedure Code, and in believing those statements in preference to the statements made by the witnesses in the Sessions Court when they profess ignorance of their assailants.