Supreme Court expounds, "The “common object” of an assembly is to be ascertained from the acts and language of the members comprising it, and from a consideration of all the surrounding circumstances. It may be gathered from the course of conduct adopted by the members of the assembly".
Supreme Court Bench comprising of Justice Ashok Bhushan and Justice Navin Sinha has passed judgement in the case titled State Of Uttar Pradesh vs. Ravindra @ Babloo and others.
The State as Appellant criticized the acquittal of the three respondents by High Court of Uttar Pradesh, reversing their conviction under Sections 302/149, 307/149, 147, 148 and 152 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 ordered by the Trial Court.
The facts of the case are such that occurrence was fueled by enmity occasioned due to a land dispute. The High Court opined that in absence of injuries on the two deceased and the injuries not being commensurate to the nature of weapons possessed by the three respondents entitled them to acquittal.
SC Bench stated that,"What the common object of the unlawful assembly is at a particular stage of the incident is essentially a question of fact to be determined, keeping in view the nature of the assembly, the arms carried by the members, and the behaviour of the members at or near the scene of the incident. Sharing of common object is a mental attitude which is to be gathered from the act of a person and result thereof. It is not necessary under law that in all cases of unlawful assembly, with an unlawful common object, the same must be translated into action or be successful".
The bench observed, “The manner of occurrence, the fact that all the accused were well armed, they chased the deceased Lokesh coupled with the assault on those who tried to come to the rescue of the deceased, the number of injuries on the two deceased and the injured leaves no doubt in our mind that the assailants were most definitely more than two persons. In the nature and number of injuries, there can be no doubt that the assailants may well have been five in number. Likewise, the fact that there may not be any firearm injury on the deceased is considered irrelevant for fixing vicarious liability as member of an unlawful assembly once the presence of the accused possessed of a weapon of assault chasing the deceased along with others stands established by reliable ocular evidence”.
SC Bench then proceeded to setaside order of the acquittal of the respondents and directed them to surrender within four weeks for serving out the remaining period of their sentence.
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