EMPEROR Vs. BHIMAPPA SAIBANNA TALWAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) We have before us the appeals of ten persons alleged to be concerned in a dacoity which took place at a house near Dharwar on the night of May 6, 1943. All the ten accused were arrested on and between June 18 and 20, 1943. The investigating police-officer sent all the ten accused, together with some other persons who had been arrested, to the Magistrate where they were detained in Magisterial custody, in each case requesting the Magistrate to record a confession. In a letter written by the investigating officer to the Magistrate, Mr. Sankolli, which is dated June 21, 1943, it is stated as follows: They (i.e. the ten accused) have been sent herewith for your custody and seven days remand. As they are willing to make a confessional statement, hence their statement may kindly be recorded under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code.

(2.) In fact no statement was taken from any of the, accused before us until July 14, 1943, when accused No. 8 made his alleged confession. This was followed by the alleged confessions of accused Nos. 6 and 10 who made their statements before the Magistrate on July 24. These three alleged confessions were made to Mr. Sankolli, the First Class Magistrate at Dharwar. Pausing there for a moment, it might well be said why this delay of three weeks in the first case and a. month and more in the other two cases, if these three accused, who are represented as going willingly to make confessions to the Magistrate, in fact were willing so to do. Search for an explanation reveals that on July 1, 1943, one Bhimappa was arrested as being concerned in this dacoity. On July 2 he was sent to the same Magistrate, Mr. Sankolli, with the letter of that date. That letter, if it be worthy of that name, is written in pencil on a flimsy piece of paper. On July 3, with unexplained and unexampled haste, contrasting strangely with the fact that the ten other accused had by then been waiting for more than a fortnight to make their confessions alleged by the prosecution to be voluntary, the confession of Bhimappa was recorded by the Magistrate. The nature of this confession is not without significance. "The accused (so the confession records) is asked if he is disposed to make a confession of his own free will. He replies as follows: I have come here to make a confession of my own free will. He states in the confession that he was arrested on July 1, that is to say two days previously. Asked what he had to say he replied: About seven months back I came to Dharwar for earning my bread and since then I am at Dharwar. He then goes on to explain how he was approached by certain persons and how on the evening of this dacoity he went to Basrikop, there met a number of other persons and they sat under a mango tree. His alleged confession continues as follows: There we prepared four torches and prepared six or seven sticks and we then proceeded to Belligatti. As soon as we reached near Belligatti we took some stones in our kambal and langoties. We then entered the village Belligatti where Jodhalli people showed the house saying that it was the house. We lighted the torches by standing in front of the said house. Myself, Govindappa, Ramchandra and Fakirappa Gorabal had each held one torch. Then we shouted loudly and threw stones here and there so that the people in the neighbourhood should not get up. Thereupon (and he gives the names of a number of the accused) and myself entered the house. Bhimapa Pyati broke down the lock with the axe put to the wooden box in the house.

(3.) He then goes on to describe what they found in the house and describes how they carried it away.