1

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION

CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 655   OF 2002

Inspector of Police, Tamil Nadu .... Appellant

Versus

Muthusamy & Anr. .... Respondents

J U D G M E N T

Dr. ARIJIT PASAYAT, J.

Heard.

Challenge  in  this  appeal  is  to  the  judgment  of  acquittal  recorded  by  a

Division Bench  of  the  Madras High  Court.   The accused  persons are the  father and

brother respectively of the deceased.  The incident purportedly took place on 3.1.1990.

Though the prosecution relied on the evidence of many persons who supposedly witnessed

the occurrence,  while deposing in Court, most of them resiled from the statements made

during investigation.  The version projected by the prosecution was that the deceased was

throttled and also poison was administered to him.  But the report of the Forensic Science

Laboratory stated that the viscera did not contain any poison.  The prosecution, therefore,

gave up its  stand that  the  deceased was administered poison by the  accused persons.

There were purportedly some extra-judicial confessions on which the Trial Court relied.

Accordingly, the accused persons were convicted for offences punishable under Section

302 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (in short 'IPC').  In appeal the

2 High Court has, by the impugned judgment, directed acquittal.   

Learned counsel for the appellant-State submitted that the analysis made by

the High Court to direct acquittal cannot be maintained as  the High Court lost sight of

several relevant factors.   

We find that the High Court has referred to the extra-judicial confessions

and found  that  they  are not  reliable.   The witnesses  gave  varying  version about  the

manner in  the  so-called  extra-judicial  confessions.   Apart from that  the  persons who

claimed  to  have  witnessed  the  incident  resiled  from  the  statements  made  during

investigation and there was practically no evidence to implicate the accused persons.  To

add to other factors, one more significant factor which the High Court has noticed is that

there was manipulation done to show as if the Magistrate had received the report from

Police Station on 3.1.1990.  In reality the date of seal found on Exh. P1 and Exh. P9 of the

Court of Keeranoor shows that the date was 5.1.1990.   In view of these discrepancies, we

are of the opinion that the High Court's judgment does not suffer from any infirmity to

warrant any interference.  The appeal fails and is accordingly dismissed.

.......................J.                              (Dr. ARIJIT PASAYAT)

.......................J.                              (HARJIT SINGH BEDI)  

New Delhi September 10, 2008