GHUNNAI Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Ghunnai was charged in the Court of the Sessions Judge of Allahabad under Section 302, Indian Penal Code. It was alleged that he had murdered a small boy of 8 years of age by chopping off his hands for the sake of some ornaments he was wearing. The learned Sessions Judge found Ghunnai guilty and sentenced him to death. Ghunnai appeals and there is before us an application for confirmation of the death sentence.

(2.) In the village of Sipauwa in the Koraon Police Circle a small boy named Rajhtan Singh disappeared towards the evening of 22 March, 1933. Several villagers searched for him. They discovered two men named Baldeo and Musau who said that they had seen the missing boy together with the accused proceeding towards the west of the village and that the accused was carrying an axe under his arm. This information was, that evening, given to the Mukhiya of the village. Ghunnai was sent for and questioned but he denied all knowledge of the missing boy. Eventually he admitted that he had been with Eajhban Singh that evening, but he said that they had separated and he knew nothing of his movements after that. A girl however named Kani was present when the Mukhiya was making his investigations and she said that she too had seen the accused, walking up and down the bank of a nala to the west of the village, with an axe under his arm. The next morning the Mukhiya and his party went to the nala and there they discovered the corpse of the missing body floating on the surface of the water. The body was taken out of the nala and it was then found that both his hands had been chopped off at the wrists. The corpse was taken to the house of Mukhiya and the accused was again charged With having murdered the boy. After having first again denied the charge, he confessed his guilt, before the assembled villagers. The accused next took the party to a small thatched hut in which he lived and in the presence of all of them produced from a hole in the floor the missing ornaments including a pair of silver wristlets, a pair of gold earrings and; a gold amulet with two corral beads. These ornaments were identified as having belonged to the deceased boy as having been worn by him on the preceding day. Further, a bandi which was identified as having been worn by the deceased boy, was discovered in the accused's hut. An axe too was discovered there. The dhoti which the accused was wearing was noticed to be stained and was sent to the chemical examiner and the Imperial Serologist. The latter report states the stains were those of human blood. It is not necessary in this case for us to attach any weight to the evidence of these reports as the other evidence, in our opinion, is overwhelming. Eventually, on another search being made at the nala two severed human hands were discovered in the water together with a stone which from the marks upon it, looked as if it had been used as a chopping block.

(3.) The evidence of all these witnesses was produced. The learned Sessions Judge says that the evidence was given in a straightforward and convincing manner. There is one point which we have to notice. It was proved by the prosecution that the accused made a confession to a crowd of villagers. Apparently the chaukidar of the village was present in the crowd. Some of the witnesses denied the presence of the chaukidar as they were under the impression - which the Sessions Judge shared - that a confession made in the presence of a chaukidar was a confession to a policeman and therefore not admissible in evidence under Section 25, Evidence Act; The learned Sessions Judge, thinking that there might possibly be a doubts upon the question as to whether the chaukidar was there or not, excluded the evidence of the confession from his consideration. On this point we have two observations to make: Firstly that a confession to a chaukidar is not, in our opinion, a confession to a policeman within the meaning of Section 25, Evidence Act. Secondly, we are not inclined to think that even if a policeman happened to be a member of a crowd of villagers and a confession was made to the villagers at large, the mere fact that a policeman happened to be present in the crowd would not make the confession under the circumstances inadmissible in evidence. There was then, in our opinion, no reason for the learned Judge to exclude the confession from his mind, and we can and do take it into consideration. The learned Sessions Judge however was perfectly right when he said that there was ample evidence to convict the accused even after he had excluded the confession.