EMPEROR Vs. HARADHAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This case comes before us on a reference by the Additional Sessions Judge of the Santal Parganas who has convicted accused Haradhan alias Haru Dome of the murder of Dukhu Dome and sentenced him to death. The prisoner has also presented an appeal from jail which has been heard along with the reference for the confirmation of the sentence. The accused is a resident of Beludabar where there are several families of Domes. Dukhu lived in an outlying hamlet named Hirandangal of the same village situated about half a mile to the west.

(2.) This tola is inhabited mostly by the Santals, Dukhu's being the only residence of a Dome in that tola. It is alleged that on the evening of 9 November 1932 at about 8 p.m. Dukhu, who had fever, was lying on a khatia in his hut which faces north on to the village path running east to west. His wife Paban, P.W. 2, was lying on another cot parallel with Dukhu's and north of it in the same room. Her two small children were on the cot with her. The accused Haru entered the room carrying an axe with which he dealt one blow on the head of Dukhu causing his death. Haru then returned to Beludabar, encountering in the way Jamadar Dome, P.W. 11, younger brother of Dukhu, who lives in Beludabar and was on his way to Hirandangal.

(3.) The defence of accused is that he is innocent. His statement before the committing Magistrate to which he adhered at the trial was that he is a peon of Sital Babu, and on the day in question spent his time in his ordinary avocations. He gave particulars of his movements. He called evidence in the Magistrate's Court to confirm his statement as to his movements. He examined no witness in the Court of Session possibly because the evidence as to his movements during the day did not apparently cover the time of the actual occurrence so as to disprove his commission of it. The further defence taken in the cross-examination of the witnesses was that he has been falsely implicated, because of enmity, by Jamadar Mirdha, and that there has been for some time past an intrigue between Jamadar Mirdha and his elder brother Dukhu's wife Paban.