Suraj Bhan
Vs. State of Haryana [2002] Insc 567 (18 December 2002)
N.Santosh
Hegde & Arun Kumar. Santosh Hegde,J.
Appellant
Suraj Bhan and four others were charged for an offence punishable under
Sections 148, 302, 325 & 323 read with Section 149 IPC for having committed
the murder of one Kehar Singh on 20.3.1989 at about 8 a.m. before the Additional Sessions Judge, Sonepat. Learned
Sessions Judge by his judgment dated 3.3.1992 convicted all the appellants
under Section 302 read with Section 149 and sentenced them to undergo
imprisonment for life. It also sentenced the accused before it for offences
under Sections 148, 149 & Section 325 read with Section 149 and Section 323
read with Section 149.
In
appeal before the High Court of Punjab & Haryana, the High Court acquitted
accused Ram Nivas A-3, Santosh A-4 and Darshan A-5 of all the offences charged
against them, giving them the benefit of doubt. While it convicted Jagmender
A-1 for an offence under Section 325 IPC and confirmed the sentence awarded on
this count by the learned Sessions Judge.
However,
in regard to the appellant before us in these appeals, it confirmed the
conviction awarded to him under Section 302 IPC and under Section 323 IPC and
the sentence awarded by the trial court on these two counts were affirmed. The
conviction of the appellant under Section 325 IPC awarded by the Sessions Court
was however set aside.
It
seems that both Jagmender, A-1 and the present appellant Suraj Bhan preferred
this appeal but from the records, we notice that the appeal of Jagmender A-1
came to be withdrawn on the ground that he had already served the sentence
imposed on him, therefore, Suraj Bhan is the lone appellant before us in this
appeal.
Briefly
stated, the prosecution case is that a week before the incident, namely,
20.3.1989, Ram Gopal, son of the appellant was caught plucking plums from the
trees standing in the field of Kehar Singh, deceased, for which he was
reprimanded by deceased Kehar Singh and his father Zile Singh. On this count,
the appellant and his family members entertained an animosity against the
deceased. On the date of the incident namely on 20.3.1989 at about 8 a.m. when
the deceased Kehar Singh and PW-9 Mehar Singh, were returning from fields, they
were attacked by the appellant and other acquitted accused persons with lathis
and bricks, consequent upon which the deceased suffered severe head injuries.
It is also stated that PW-9 also received injury in this attack. It is the
prosecution case that after the attack the accused persons fled from the scene
of occurrence and the deceased and PW-9 were taken to the Primary Health
Centre, Juan but in view of the seriousness of the injuries suffered by the
deceased, the local doctor referred them to the General Hospital at Sonepat
where they reached at about 4.30 p.m. PW-14, the doctor who treated the
deceased and PW-9 thought it fit that the deceased should be sent to the
Medical College Hospital at Rohtak, hence, while treating PW-9, he sent the
deceased to the said hospital at Rohtak. The further case of the prosecution is
that in view of the fact that PW-9 Mehar Singh had to attend an examination, he
went back to his place while deceased Kehar Singh was taken to the hospital by
his uncle. After completing the examination, it is stated that PW-9 came to the
hospital at Rohtak in the evening when he came to know that his brother had
died so an intimation was sent to the Police Station at Gannaur where a
complaint was registered and a special report was forwarded to the Ilaka
Magistrate, Sonepat at 3
a.m. on 21.3.1989.
Based on the said complaint, the investigating officer, PW-13 recorded the
statements of the witnesses and on completion of the investigation, filed a chargesheet
against the above-mentioned 5 accused persons.
The
prosecution in support of its case examined PW-2, Dr. Satbir Singh, Medical
Officer, Primary Health Centre, Juan, had stated that on 20.5.1989 when the
deceased was brought to him, he was in a very serious condition and he could
not treat him appropriately, hence, he made an entry in the OPD register and
directed the said patient to be taken to the Medical College Hospital at Rohtak.
PW-14, Dr. Ranjana Parihar, who examined the deceased when he was still alive
on 20.3.1989 had stated that when she examined him, the patient was unconscious
and she noticed 3 external injuries on him out of which injury No.1 was a
contusion around the left eye with swelling of left upper and lower limb;
injury No.2 was a defused swelling over left parietal area and the temporal
region and injury No.3 was an abrasion on the lateral aspect of the left upper
arm. She also stated that she had examined PW-9, Mehar Singh, at about 12 p.m. on that day on whom she noticed 2 injuries; the
first one was a lacerated wound on the forehead and the second one was an
abrasion on the thumb.
PW-15,
Dr. Partap Singh, Medical Officer General Hospital, Hissar who conducted the
post mortem on the dead body, having noticed the external injuries had opined
that all the injuries were anti-mortem in nature and the cause of death was due
to shock and haemorrhage as a result of head injury which was sufficient to
cause death in the ordinary course of nature. From the above medical evidence
it is clear as held by the courts below, that the prosecution has proved that
deceased Kehar Singh died a homicidal death.
The
question then is : who is responsible for this attack on the deceased as well
as on PW-9. For this purpose, the prosecution primarily relies on the evidence
of PW-9 and PW- 10 who were the eye-witnesses to the incident in question. the
Sessions Court relied on the evidence of these witnesses to come to the
conclusion that the accused persons before it were responsible for causing the
death of deceased Kehar Singh while the High Court came to the conclusion
relying on the very same evidence that it is not safe to convict A-3 to A-5 of
the offences charged against them since there is a possibility of the
prosecution witnesses roping in the entire family of the appellant, hence,
taking a cautious view of the matter, it found A-1 Jagmender guilty of an
offence punishable u/s. 325 IPC and convicted him, as stated above, while the
present appellant was found guilty of offence u/s. 302 IPC.
Dr. G
S Sangwan, learned counsel appearing for the appellant, contended that in view
of the discrepancies and improvements found in the prosecution case, it is not
safe to rely upon the same even to convict the appellant herein. For this
purpose he pointed out that PW-9 who is supposed to be an injured witness, has
stated in his evidence that while the appellant gave a lathi blow to the
deceased on the left side of his head, A-1 Jagmender also gave a lathi blow to
the deceased on the left side of his head. Learned counsel pointed out that
this witness had further stated that a third lathi blow was wielded on the
deceased by accused Ram Niwas which hit the deceased above his left eye.
Learned counsel pointed out that if we compare this evidence of the eye witness
with the medical evidence, it is noticed that the deceased had suffered only
one injury on his head, therefore, the prosecution has failed to explain the
discrepancy between the ocular and medical evidence. In such circumstances, he
contended that it is not safe to rely on the evidence of this witness. He also
pointed out that most likely, this witness was not present at the time of the
incident because even according to him, he had an examination to attend in the
evening of the date of the incident which he did attend and relying on the
sequence of events that has taken place and the distance which this witness had
to cover from the hospital to the place of the examination, he contends that it
is highly improbable that he was present at the place of incident.
He
also pointed out that the complaint in question was lodged by this witness at about
7 p.m. when the incident as such had taken
place at about 8 a.m., therefore, no reliance should be
placed on the evidence of this witness. Commenting on the evidence of PW-10,
learned counsel submitted that though this witness had stated that the deceased
was assaulted only once by the appellant, rest of his evidence contains so much
of improvements that it is not safe to rely upon this witness, mainly because
of the fact that he was a close relative of the deceased and his presence at
the place of the incident was also doubtful.
As
contended by the learned counsel for the appellant, we have noticed that there
is some contradiction in the evidence of PW-9 and the medical evidence. While
the medical evidence notices one injury on the left parietal bone of the
deceased and the doctor has stated that the other external injury found on the
head of the deceased was consequential to the first injury;
evidence
of PW-9 shows that there was more than one assault on the deceased i.e. from
the appellant. The courts below have accepted this part of PW-9's evidence.
While appreciating the evidence of PW-9, we should bear in mind the fact that
this witness was also a victim of attack simultaneously when the deceased was
attacked. It is possible that this witness might not have witnessed the number
of attacks on the deceased while he must have been trying to concentrate on
defending himself but the fact remains and he has stated that the appellant
attacked the deceased on his head with a lathi which injury corresponds to the
injury noticed by the doctor. If we read his evidence in conjunction with the
evidence of PW-10, it is crystal clear that so far as the injury suffered by
the deceased on his head is concerned, the same was dealt with by the appellant
herein, and the consequence of such blow on the head of the deceased has been
spoken to by the medical evidence adduced by the prosecution. We find no
contradiction in the evidence of PW-10 so far as this part of the prosecution
case is concerned while of course he has made some improvements in his evidence
in regard to some other aspect of the case with which we are not concerned
while considering the case of the appellant. Since the two courts below have
chosen to place reliance on the evidence of PWs.9 and 10 which we do not
consider to be either unreasonable or perverse, we are also inclined to accept
the same. If that be so, it is clear that this appellant had dealt a blow on
the left parietal side of the head of the deceased consequent to which the
deceased has died, therefore, the High Court is justified in coming to the
conclusion that this accused is responsible for the death of the deceased.
Hence, we find no ground to interfere with the finding of the High Court on
this count.
Learned
counsel then argued that since the appellant has dealt only a single blow, the
offence if at all, cannot be the one falling u/s. 302 IPC or at the most, it
would come u/s. 304, Part II, IPC since there is absolutely no material to show
that the appellant had any knowledge that he would be causing an imminent death
of the deceased. In this regard we have examined the medical evidence and the
manner in which the assault in question has taken place. The doctor has opined
that the injury was caused in such a manner as to cause the death of the
deceased which on dissection found by the doctor, had caused a fracture of the
left parietal bone causing extra dural haemotoma. The doctor has opined that
the death was due to shock and haemorrhage and as a result of the head injury
which was sufficient to cause death in the ordinary course of nature.
We are
of the opinion that the appellant must be attributed with the knowledge that
when he used a lathi forcefully on the head of a person, he was likely to cause
death of the said person, the prosecution has also proved that this appellant
had the intention to kill the deceased, therefore, we have no hesitation in
rejecting the argument of learned counsel on this count also For the reasons
stated above this appeal fails and the same is hereby dismissed.
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