The Supreme Court hearing a criminal appeal overturned the High court’s conviction in a case of dowry death after reaching to the conclusion that the deceased wife did not die an unnatural death.
Facts
The deceased wife was married to the first appellant. As per the father of the deceased, the appellants who are the husband and the in-laws of the deceased used to torture her for dowry. One month before the fateful incident the deceased with her husband came to her father asking for 10 lakh rupees. The father got a call from the deceased on the day of her death that her in-laws were forcing her to take poison hearing which the father called the police and headed to the appellant’s house where they found the dead body of the deceased in the car of the appellant. Charges were brought by the respondents against the appellants under Section 304 B of IPC for dowry death. The trial court upon evaluating the fact acquitted the appellants on the grounds that there was not enough evidence to establish any demand for dowry and neither was there enough material on record to show the death was due to poisoning. An appeal was filed by the respondents in the high court which convicted the appellants after reaching a different conclusion and sentenced them life imprisonment. The conviction by the high court was challenged by the appellants in the criminal appeal in the Apex court.
Appellant’s Plea
The counsel for the appellant submitted that the deceased was already suffering from multiple medical conditions for which she was receiving treatment and the prosecution has failed to prove that the death was unnatural. The counsel further submitted that there was no presence of any poisonous substance in the medical report of the deceased and neither was there any mark of injury on the body of the deceased. It was also contended from the appellant’s side that there was no demand for dowry at any point of time. The appellant prayed that the high court’s conviction be reversed since it was erroneous and against the well-settled principles of law.
The Respondent’s Submissions
The respondent’s counsel contended that there was harassment and dowry demand after the marriage and the phone calls from the deceased and testimony of the witnesses were enough to prove that. The counsel pleaded that the impugned judgement must be upheld and the conviction be maintained.
The Court’s Decision
The Supreme Court bench of Justice RF Nariman, Justice KM Joseph and Justice Aniruddha Bose observed that the ingredients for the offense of dowry death under section 304 B of IPC were not established in the present case. The court noted that the testimonies of the father and brother of the deceased were contradictory and questionable and further noted that asking for 10 lakh rupees from the wife’s father to return them in future cannot be seen as a demand for dowry. The court further relied on the forensic and medical reports which ruled out any possibility of presence of any poisonous substance to establish the fact that the death of the wife was not caused by poisoning and neither were there any marks of injury to prove any struggle before death. The court held that since the deceased was already suffering from multiple medical conditions it was possible that she succumbed to them and added that the prosecution failed to establish that the wife died due to unnatural causes which were one of the essential ingredients to prove dowry death. Thus the court overturning the high court’s decision acquitted the appellants and remarked “We find it certainly not a circumstance so as to draw an inference that the deceased died an unnatural death or that the appellants administered poison to her. We would think that the High Court has clearly erred in interfering with the acquittal of the appellants.”
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