Allahabad High Court
Smt. Sonam vs State Of U.P. And 3 Others on 11 March, 2025
Author: Siddharth
Bench: Siddharth
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
Neutral Citation No. - 2025:AHC:36724-DB
Court No. - 47
Case :- CRIMINAL APPEAL U/S 372 CR.P.C. No. - 301 of 2023
Appellant :- Smt. Sonam
Respondent :- State Of U.P. And 3 Others
Counsel for Appellant :- Sarfaraj Ahamad Siddiquei,Suhel Akhtar
Counsel for Respondent :- G.A.
Hon'ble Siddharth,J.
Hon'ble Praveen Kumar Giri,J.
1. Heard Sri Suhel Akhtar, learned counsel for the appellant, learned A.G.A. for the State and perused the material on record.
2. The appeal is filed by the wife of the deceased, Vinesh Kumar, against the judgement and order of acquittal dated 20.03.2023 passed by learned Additional District and Sessions Judge, Court No. 5, Bulandshahr, in Sessions Case No. 306/2019 and 288/2020 (State of Uttar Pradesh Versus Kuldeep and others) arising out of Case Crime No. 206 of 2019, under sections 304/34, 504 and 506 I.P.C., Police Station Gulawati, District Bulandshahr.
3. The prosecution story is that the complainant, namely, Dinesh @ Titu has given a typed application on 04/04/2019 at police station Gulawati, District Bulandshahr stating therein that complainant and his brother, Vinesh @ Vinnu son of Tejveer Singh, Resident of village Barmadpur, police station Gulawati, District Bulandshahr is a peace loving person. Kuldeep had taken Rs. 23,000 from complainant, when his brother, Vinesh, demanded Rs. 23000 Kuldeep abused Vinesh and threatened the complainant to kill him. Hearing the abuses, Vinesh came to his home and Kuldeep threatened to kill the complainant. The complainant and his brother came to Gulawati on 3.4.2019 at 9 p.m. for their work. After completing their work, the complainant and his brother were having dinner at Saini Hotel, Gulawati, at the same time, four persons, namely, Kuldeep son of Jagat Singh, Devendra alias Mukhiya son of Ramnarayan residents of village Barmadpur, Vinod son of Jagmal resident of village Samkola and an unknown person came in a silver colour Santro car and immediately started fighting with the complainant and his brother. Kuldeep had a pistol in his hand. He hit on the complainant and his brother's head several times with the butt of the pistol. Due to this injury, the complainant and his brother fell unconscious. The complainant's brother had a golden chain around his neck whose weight was about 10 grams which they took away. At that time, Phire Singh, son of Gopichand, resident of Barmadpur, was with the complainant at the spot. At the time of incident Phire Singh was standing aside and talking on the phone. Hearing the noise Phire Singh came and tried to intervene but he was also threatened by the accused persons. Phire singh called on 100 Number and police came and the complainant's brother was immediately picked up and taken to the government hospital Gulawati. The government hospital, officials referred the complainant's brother to Devnandini Hospital, Hapur. The complainant's brother is still in coma and has not regained consciousness.
4. F.I.R. was lodged on 05.04.2019 at Police Station- Gulawati, District- bulandshahr, being Case Crime No. 206 of 2019, under Sections- 308, 394, 504, 506 I.P.C.
5. The investigation was done and on conclusion of the investigation, charge-sheet was submitted on 04.06.2019 under sections 304/34, 504, 506 IPC. before the Court of C.J.M., Bulandshahar and charges were framed by the trial court accordingly.
6. Thereafter, accused appeared before the Court and pleaded not guilty and sought trial.
7. The prosecution in order to prove its case has examined as many as 9 witnesses in the form of PW-1, Dinesh Informant, Sumit Kumar; PW-2, Satvir; PW-3, Head Constable Pravesh Kumar; PW-4, Dr. Amit Kumar; PW-5, Dr. Pramod Kumar Verma; PW-6, S.I. Vishnu Singh; PW-7, S.I. Suresh Kumar; PW-8, I.O. Fireram; PW-9.
8. After prosecution evidence was completed the accused-respondents were put to question under section 313 Cr.P.C. wherein they stated that they were falsely implicated in the present case and the witnesses which were produced had given false evidence. They also produced the defence witnesses, namely, Ajab singh, DW-1; Jor Singh DW-2; Virendra Singh, DW-3; Tarif, DW-4; Chaman, DW-5 and Fireram, DW-6 before the trial court.
9. Trial court has acquitted the accused-respondent holding that the prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond all reasonable doubt.
10. Learned counsel for the appellant has submitted that trial court has misread the evidence on record and wrongly acquitted the respondents.
11. The appellate Court is usually reluctant to interfere with a judgment acquitting an accused on the principle that the presumption of innocence in favour of the accused is reinforced by such a judgment. The above principle has been consistently followed by the Constitutional Court while deciding appeals against acquittal by way of Article 136 of the Constitution or appeals filed under Section 378 and 386 (a) Cr.P.C. in State of M.P. Vs. Sharad Goswami,(2021) 17 SCC 783; State of Rajasthan Vs. Shera Ram, (2012) 1 SCC 602, Shivaji Sahabrao Bobade Vs. State of Maharastra, (1973) 2 SCC 793.
12. The Supreme Court in the case of Ramesh Babulal Doshi Vs. State of Gujarat, (1996) 9 SCC 225 has observed that the High Court must examine the reasons given by the trial Court for recording their acquittal before disturbing the same by re-appraising the evidence recorded by the trial court. For clarity, para 7 is extracted herein below:
"Before proceeding further it will be pertinent to mention that the entire approach of the High Court in dealing with the appeal was patently wrong for it did not at all address itself to the question as to whether the reasons which weighed with the trial Court for recording the order of acquittal were proper or not. Instead thereof the High Court made an independent reappraisal of the entire evidence to arrive at the above quoted conclusions. This Court has repeatedly laid down that the mere fact that a view other than the one taken by the trial Court can be legitimately arrived at by the appellate Court on reappraisal of the evidence cannot constitute a valid and sufficient ground to interfere with an order of acquittal unless it comes to the conclusion that the entire approach of the trial Court in dealing with the evidence was patently illegal or the conclusions arrived at by it were wholly untenable. While sitting in judgment over an acquittal the appellant Court is first required to seek an answer to the question whether the findings of the trial Court are palpably wrong, manifestly erroneous or demonstrably unsustainable. If the appellant Court answers the above question in the negative the order of acquittal is not to be disturbed. Conversely, if the appellant Court holds, for reasons to be recorded, that the order of acquittal cannot at all be sustained in view of any of the above infirmities it can then - and then only - reappraise the evidence to arrive at its own conclusions. In keeping with the above principles we have therefore to first ascertain whether the findings of the trial Court are sustainable or not."
13. The Supreme Court in the case of Sadhu Saran Singh Vs. State of U.P., (2016) 4 SCC 357 has observed that an appeal against acquittal has always been on an altogether different pedestal from an appeal against conviction. In an appeal against acquittal, where the presumption of innocence in favour of the accused is reinforced, the appellate court would interfere with the order of acquittal only when there is perversity.
14. The Supreme Court in the case Basheera Begam Vs. Mohd. Ibrahim, (2020) 11 SCC 174 has held that the burden of proving an accused guilty beyond all reasonable doubt lies on the prosecution. If, upon analysis of evidence, two views are possible, one which points to the guilt of the accused and the other which is inconsistent with the guilt of the accused, the latter must be preferred. Reversal of a judgment and other of conviction and acquittal of the accused should not ordinarily be interfered with unless such reversal/acquittal is vitiated by perversity. In other words, the court might reverse an order of acquittal if the court finds that no person properly instructed in law could have, upon analysis of the evidence on record, found the accused to be "not guilty". When circumstantial evidence points to the guilt of the accused, it is necessary to prove a motive for the crime. However, motive need not be proved where there is direct evidence. In this case, there is no direct evidence of the crime.
15. The Supreme Court in the case of Kali Ram Vs. State of H.P., (1973) 2 SCC 808 has observed as under:
"25. Another golden thread which runs through the web of the administration of justice in criminal cases is that if two views are possible on the evidence adduced in the case, one pointing to the guilt of the accused and other to his innocence, the view which is favourable to the accused should be adopted. This principle has a special relevance in cases wherein the guilt of the accused is sought is to established by circumstantial evidence."
16. The Supreme Court again examined in State of Odisha v. Banabihari Mohapatra & Ors, (2021) 15 SCC 268 the effect of the probability of two views in cases of appeal against acquittal and held that if two views are possible on the evidence adduced in the case, one pointing to the guilt of the accused, and the other to his innocence, the view which is favourable to the accused should be adopted.
17. The Supreme Court in Sujit Biswas v. State of Assam, (2013) 12 SCC 406 has reiterated the position that suspicion, however strong, cannot replace proof. An accused is presumed to be innocent unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
18. In the background of the law discussed herein above, we will examine the trial court's findings and evidence adduced during the trial by the witnesses to test the legality and validity of the impugned order.
19. We have perused the depositions of prosecution witnesses, defence witnesses, documentary evidence and arguments advanced by learned counsel for the appellant. This Court finds that the F.I.R. has been lodged after a gap of two days from the alleged incident while the injured (brother of the informant) has been admitted by the police in the hospital as accidental case and in the belated F.I.R. the informant himself admitted that he has also received injury with the back side of the country made pistol but there is no injury report of the informant. The statement of the informant under section 161 Cr.P.C. has been recorded after long gap and in the injury report as well as post mortem report there are other injuries on the other parts of the body of the deceased when the injured claims himself to be eye witness of the alleged incident as per the statement of injured the accused has caused injury only on the head of the deceased. The injury report of the deceased is reproduced herein below:
"1. चुटैल के बांयी भैं के ऊपर 6 से०मी० X 3 से०मी० की सूजन थी।
2. चुटैल के बांई चेहरे पर बांई आँख के पास 10 से०मी० X 7 से०मी० की लालिमा लेते हुए खुरसट के साथ सूजन थी।"
20. The injured died due to septicaemia after few days while the F.I.R. was registered as Case Crime No. 206 of 2019, under sections 308, 394, 504 and 506 I.P.C. and later on it was converted under section 304, 504 and 506 I.P.C. The Doctor has also given statement that it is a case of accident. The witnesses deposed contrary to the version of the F.I.R. Thus the prosecution failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt. Therefore, there is no infirmity in the judgment of the trial court. The acquittal order is justified. In that view of the matter, we are unable to satisfy ourselves with the submissions of learned counsel for the appellant and we concur with the findings of the trial court.
21. The judgment of the trial court is well considered and we have not found any perversity in the findings recorded by the trial court.
22. The criminal appeal is dismissed.
23. Let Trial Court's record alongwith copy of this judgment be sent to the trial court within two weeks.
Order Date :- 11.3.2025
K.K. Maurya
