2024 INSC 633

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REPORTABLE

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA 2024 INSC 633 CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION

CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 1151 OF 2010

Raju and Another ….Appellant(s)

versus

State of Uttarakhand ….Respondent(s)

JUDGEMENT

SURYA KANT, J.

the High Court of Uttarakhand at Nainital (hereinafter, ‘High Court’) in Appeal

No. 1458/2001, whereby the judgment and order dated 13.10.1995 of the

Additional Sessions Judge­cum­Special Judge, Dehradun (hereinafter, ‘Trial

Court’) in S.T. No. 116/1994 was substantially set aside and the Appellant was

convicted under Section 307 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (hereinafter, ‘IPC’)

and sentenced to undergo seven years of rigorous imprisonment, along with a fine

of Rs. 1000/­.

FACTS:

the FIR to clearly understand the context of the instant appeal.

2.1. Signature Not Verified On 08.05.1994, Farzan Ali, the Complainant, filed an FIR being Case Crime satish kumar yadav

No. 84/1994 at the Vikasnagar Police Station, Dehradun, recounting the events of

the previous night. He reported that his son Imran, along with his friends Mathu,

Irfan, and Jakir, had gone for a late­night cinema show in Vikasnagar. On their

return around 12:30 a.m., they saw the Appellant and the other accused—Raju,

Bhola Ram, Manoj, and Suresh — standing near Gopal's house. The Appellant

and Bhola Ram were armed with knives, while Manoj and Suresh were carrying

dandas/lathis. The accused were seen in the light of a singular bulb lit in front of

Devdutt’s house.

2.2. The FIR states that Mathu and Imran inquired from the accused persons as

to why they had assembled there, which allegedly infuriated them and they

(accused) started hurling abuses at them and assaulted Imran, Mathu, Irfan and

Jakir. Imran and Mathu were attacked with knives and lathis, whereas Irfan and

Jakir suffered injuries as they tried to save them. Thereafter, presuming Imran

and Mathu to be dead, the accused fled from the place of incidence. The

Complainant further detailed that Jakir and Irfan came to his house and narrated

the entire incident to him. This formed the basis for the Complaint at Vikasnagar

Police Station and the said FIR was registered.

2.3. The investigating officer commenced the investigation, followed by a

chargesheet. The Trial Court thereafter framed charges for offences punishable

under Section 307 read with Section 34 of the IPC, against the Appellant and the

other accused. The Trial Court, evaluated the statements of the prosecution

witnesses, sought the medical opinion to be brought on record, analysed the

statement of the investigating officer, recorded the statements of the accused

under Section 313 of the CrPC, and decided to acquit the Appellant and his co­

accused vide judgment dated 13.10.1995.

2.4. The State felt aggrieved and challenged the acquittal of the Appellant and

other accused before the High Court. The High Court, as already mentioned in the

opening paragraph, partially allowed the appeal, sentenced the Appellant and one

of his co­accused to rigorous imprisonment for seven years and confirmed the

acquittal of the other two accused.

2.5. We have heard Learned Counsel(s) for the parties at a considerable length

and perused the trial record with their able assistance.

CONTENTIONS OF PARTIES

assailing the reversal of acquittal, contended that the High Court has failed to

appreciate the evidence on record due to which it arrived at an erroneous finding.

Mr. Sharma impressed that the Complainant, Farzan, was not an eye­witness to

the alleged incident. He admittedly arrived at the scene only after being told about

it. Learned counsel highlighted the glaring contradictions between the account

provided in the FIR and the testimonies of the witnesses, as recorded by the Trial

Court.

the absence of discernible evidence to prove that the Appellant and another

accused were holding knives and had caused stab injuries. In the same vein, he

contended that the testimonies of the injured witnesses and medical experts,

combined with the inconsistencies in the Complainant’s account, have unfolded

significant gaps in the investigation conducted.

Appellant, along with the other accused, Bhola, voluntarily inflicted injuries upon

Mathu and Imran with a knife, with the intention to cause death. He asserted that

the injured witness Mathu, in his testimony, stated that at the time of the

incident, both, the Appellant and Bhola were armed with knives. This testimony,

he argued, aligned with the opinion of the medical expert, who had opined that

Mathu’s injuries had been caused by some sharp object.

on record unmistakably justifies the conviction of the Appellant under Section 307

of the IPC?

ANALYSIS

that a conviction under Section 307 of the IPC may be justified only if the accused

in question possessed intent coupled with some overt act in aid of its execution. 1

Ascertaining the intention to kill or having the knowledge that death may be

caused as a result of the overt act, is a question of fact and hinges on the unique

circumstances that each case may present. Though these fundamentals have been

established in a plethora of decisions across several decades, we have briefly

mentioned the same to ensure a lucid understanding of the rationale behind the

instant decision.

context may perhaps be ascertained through the material on record, consisting

the testimonies of the witnesses; medical opinion and the very first version of

events contained in the FIR itself.

in the prosecution story. We say so for the reasons that, firstly, the testimonies of

PW2 and PW3, Mathu and Imran, are inherently contradictory to the narrative of

the prosecution, insofar as the sequence of events and the roles attributed to the

accused persons are concerned. Mathu for instance, admitted during his cross

1 State of Maharashtra v. Balram Bama Patil, 1983 (2) SCC 28; Vasant Vithu Jadhav v. State of Maharashtra, AIR 2004 SC 2678.

examination that he could not identify as to who among the accused persons

inflicted stab wounds and who used lathis.

that all the four accused persons were found standing near Gopal’s house, with

the Appellant and Bhola carrying knives and Manoj and Suresh holding lathis.

However, upon being cross­examined, he changed his position, claiming that

Bhola and the Appellant lashed them with lathis while the other two accused

arrived at the place of incidence from the direction of their house. Given the

incertitude in regards to the roles attributed to the accused persons, the

conviction of the Appellant or his co­accused by the High Court becomes all the

more questionable.

adduced by witnesses; the medical reports and the opinions, in terms of the

nature of injuries suffered by Mathu and Imran. Specifically, it is undisputed that

the injuries suffered by the victims were not caused by lathis or a blunt weapon.

Similarly, the evidence regarding the placement and extent of knife injuries

sustained by Mathu and Imran does not inspire confidence. Hence, the questions

surrounding the use of lathis or knives have undermined the prosecution case,

just as they have cast doubt on the extent and nature of injuries sustained by the

injured witnesses.

murky is the fact that the FIR itself was lodged by a hearsay witness, namely, PWI

Farzan, who is Imran’s father. Notably, Farzan was not present at the scene and

only learned about the incident through alleged eye­witnesses Jakir and Irfan,

both of whom had accompanied Imran and Mathu when the latter were allegedly

attacked by the Appellant and other accused persons. Ironically, there is not even

a whisper about the alleged eye­witnesses, Jakir and Irfan joining the

investigation. These persons were apparently ghost witnesses who neither had

their statements recorded by the Investigating Officer under Section 161 of the

CrPC nor were they produced by the prosecution before the Trial Court. Similarly,

no attempt was made to record their version under Section 164, CrPC. The

discrepancies elucidated above could have been clarified with ease had these eye­

witnesses been produced or their statements recorded, shedding light on the

sequence of events as they unfolded. The deafening absence of these two alleged

eye­witnesses, in our considered opinion, has considerably weakened the

prosecution case.

in the account given by a witness, especially when there is conspicuous disparity

between the date of the incident and the time of deposition. However, if the

discrepancies are such that they create serious doubt on the veracity of a witness,

then the Court may deduce and decline to rely on such evidence. This is especially

true when there are variations in the evidence tendered by prosecution witnesses

regarding the sequence of events as they have occurred. Courts must exercise all

the more care and conscientiousness when such oral evidence may lean towards

falsely implicating innocent persons.2

that the prosecution sought to present. The prosecution story has been

demolished by the oral testimonies of the witnesses, including the medical

experts, coupled with the contents of the FIR registered by a hearsay witness. It

2 Andhra Pradesh v. Pullagummi Kasi Reddy Krishna Reddy, (2018) 7 SCC 623.

goes without saying that the chain of evidence proffered by the prosecution has to

be as complete as is humanly possible and it does not leave any reasonable

ground for a conclusion consistent with the innocence of the accused and must

instead, indicate that the act had indeed been singularly committed by the

accused only.3

his co­accused Bhola, in order to justify their conviction under Section 307 of the

IPC. Both the injured witnesses, Imran and Mathu, during their cross­

examination, clearly explicated that there was no enmity or ill will between them

and the accused persons. It is not even the prosecution’s case that this was a

chance occurrence. It seems that the accused and the alleged victims were

familiar with each other and had some kind of association. There is thus more to

this than meets the eye, and we are not entirely convinced of the narrative

presented and perceived by the prosecution.

the glaring inconsistencies, before reversing a well­reasoned order of acquittal. It

is a well­established canon of law that when the Trial Court has acquitted the

accused based on a plausible understanding of the evidence, and such finding is

not marred by perversity or due to overlooking or misreading of the evidence

presented by the prosecution, the High Court ought not to overturn such an order

of acquittal4. We are inclined to hold that the Trial Court, after reviewing the entire

evidence on record, was correct in concluding that the totality of circumstances

casts doubt on the alleged incident and suggests that the prosecution witnesses

3 Hanumant v. State of Madhya Pradesh, (1952) SCR 1091; Ram Gopal v. State of Maharashtra, AIR 1972 SC 656; Sharad Birdhi Chand Sarda v. State of Maharashtra, 1984 AIR 1622. 4Darshan Singh v. State of Punjab, (2010) 2 SCC 333; Ballu@Balram v. State of Madhya Pradesh, Crl. Appeal No. 1167.2018.

may have concealed the actual story.

CONCLUSION AND DIRECTIONS

laconic evidence. Rather, we deem it appropriate to allow this appeal and acquit

the Appellant in FIR Case Crime No. 84/1994. Accordingly, the order of conviction

by the High Court dated 10.12.2009 is set aside, and that of the Trial Court dated

13.10.1995 is restored in so far as the Appellant is concerned. The bail bonds, if

any, furnished by the Appellant are hereby cancelled.

………..………………… J. (SURYA KANT)

……………………………J. (DIPANKAR DATTA)

……………………………J. (UJJAL BHUYAN)

NEW DELHI DATED : 31.07.2024