| Headnote |
Issue for consideration: Six deaths were caused on account of brutal firing by the appellants and other accused persons. The trial court imposed sentence of capital punishment to the appellants (‘M’ and ‘S’) herein for the offence punishable u/s. 302 r/w. s.149 of IPC, while it sentenced accused ‘I’ to imprisonment for life for the same. (i) Whether the prosecution has proved beyond reasonable doubt the case for conviction u/s. 302 of IPC; (ii) Whether the present case falls in the category of rarest of rare cases; (ii) Whether on the facts of the present case, the capital punishment imposed on appellantdeserves to be maintained or not. Penal Code, 1860 – s. 302 r/w. s.149 – The High Court, by the impugned judgment, while commuting the sentence of appellant ‘S’ from capital punishment to imprisonment for life, dismissed the appeals filed by appellant ‘M’ and accused ‘I’ and confirmed their conviction and sentence awarded by the trial court – The High Court further confirmed the Death Reference of the appellant ‘M’ – Propriety:Held: The incident has taken place in two parts: The first place is near the house of ‘R’ – Appellant ‘M’ along with ‘I’ and other accused armed with licensed guns, rifles and country-made pistols came from behind and started firing indiscriminately – As a result of which, two fell down on the Khadanja and died on the spot – When ‘MA’, after hearing the sound of gunfire, came out of his house, the accused persons also fired shots at him – As a result of which, he also fell down – The second place is the house of Up-Pradhan-‘RN’ – After indiscriminate firing by the accused persons, deceased ‘RK’ and PW-2 ran away to save their lives and RK entered the house of ‘RN’ – The accused persons followed them and entered into the house of ‘RN’ and fired shots at RK and two other persons – As a result of which, all three died – The prosecution has duly proved its case beyond reasonable doubt in view of the testimony of PW-1 being duly corroborated by the testimonies of PW-10 and PW-11 – This Court is of the considered view that the testimonies of these witnesses duly establish that these witnesses have witnessed the firing on three persons, who died on the spot – These witnesses have also seen the accused persons assaulting RK and PW-2 who had received the firearm injuries, who ran to the house of to take shelter – This Court is further of the considered view that though PW-7 is a sole witness insofar as the firing on deceased three persons is concerned, his testimony is cogent, reliable and trustworthy and can be made basis for coming to a conclusion that it is the present appellants along with other accused who have caused the death of deceased – In any case, his testimony is duly corroborated by the evidence of PW-1 who had immediately come to the second spot after the occurrence of the incident when PW-7 informed PW-1 about the incident occurring in his house – In the instant case, both the High Court and the trial court have meticulously scrutinized the evidence and found the testimony of the eye witnesses trustworthy and reliable – This Court after scrutinizing the evidence again find that merely because there are certain inconsistencies in the evidence of the witnesses, their evidence cannot be discarded – In totality of the circumstances, the prosecution has proved beyond reasonable doubt the case for conviction u/s. 302 of IPC and the appeals in that regard are liable to be rejected. [Paras 27, 39, 42, 43, 49] Penal Code, 1860 – Whether the present case falls in the category of rarest of rare cases:Held: Six deaths were caused on account of brutal firing by the appellants and other accused persons – The entire village and the people residing in the surrounding areas must have been shocked by such heinous and gruesome act – Not only that, one of the eye witnesses was also murdered during the pendency of the trial – The terror of the appellants and other accused persons was of such a high magnitude that even the witnesses who had received grievous injuries did not support the prosecution case and were required to be declared hostile – As such, four innocent persons were shot from behind – Therefore, the act of the appellants and the other accused would certainly be the one which shocked the collective conscience of the society and fall in the category of rarest of rare cases. [Para 57] Penal Code, 1860 – Whether on the facts of the present case, the capital punishment imposed on appellants deserves to be maintained or not.Held: As per the Prison Conduct Report submitted by the Superintendent, District Jail, appellant ‘M’ is currently 64 years old – He has been in prison for 18 years 3 months – During this entire duration, he has no history of any kind of prison offence – The Report further shows that he has not been involved in any form of quarrels or fights in prison – The Report shows that he has cordial relations with other prisoners in his barrack and follows the prison rules – Taking into consideration all these factors, this Court finds that the present case is not a case wherein it can be held that imposition of death penalty is the only alternative – Another reason that weighs is that from the evidence of the witnesses, it is clear that the role attributed to all the accused persons has been similar – The evidence of witnesses would show that the role attributed is that all the accused persons including both the appellants herein had fired shots and indiscriminately indulged in the said firing – The role attributed in the evidence of the eye witnesses is identical to all the accused – In that view of the matter, the High Court was not justified in imposing death penalty on appellant ‘M’ while converting the death penalty imposed upon ‘S’ to life imprisonment – If the judgment of the High Court is maintained, it would lead to an anomalous situation – Whereas appellant ‘S’ would be entitled for consideration of his case for remission and pre-mature release on completion of a particular number of years in accordance with the relevant rules, appellant ‘M’ will have to face death penalty – Therefore, the interest of justice would be met by converting death penalty into life imprisonment i.e. actual imprisonment for a period of 20 years without remission – Appeal filed by ‘S’ dismissed and the appeal filed by appellant- ‘M’partly allowed by converting his death penalty into imprisonment for a fix term of 20 years. [Paras 69, 76-78] |
