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PETITIONER: MAJOR SINGH & ORS.

       Vs.

RESPONDENT: STATE OF PUNJAB

DATE OF JUDGMENT:       16/08/1996

BENCH: MUKHERJEE M.K. (J) BENCH: MUKHERJEE M.K. (J) KURDUKAR S.P. (J)

CITATION:  1996 SCALE  (5)868

ACT:

HEADNOTE:

JUDGMENT:                       J U D G M E N T M.K. MUKHERJEE. J.      This appeal  under Section 14 of the Terrorist Affected Areas (Special  Courts) Act,  1984 is  directed against  the judgment and  order dated May 18, 1985 in case No.76 of 1984 whereby the Special Court, Ferozepur convicted and sentenced the four appellants under Sections 302/34 and 307/34 IPC and further convicted  and sentenced  the appellant  Nazar Singh under Section 25 of the Arms Act, 1959, while acquitting two others. 2(a) Teja  Singh (the  deceased) was  the brother of accused Major Singh,Nazar  Singh (two  of the  appellants before us) and  Charan   Singh  (since  acquitted).  According  to  the prosecution case  the  house  of  the  above  three  accused persons is behind the house of Teja Singh. They had put that house under  lock and key and constructed another house on a plot which  was jointly  owned by  them and Teja Singh. Teja Singh and  his sons  had requested  them to  hand over their house in  the village  abadi to  them in lieu of their house constructed on the joint plot. The accused persons, however, did not  agree to  the proposal  and over  this issue  their relationship became strained. (b)  On March  22, 1984  at or  about 6  A.M.  Jalour  Singh (P.W.4), Harnek  Singh (P.W.9)  and Joginder Singh (P.W.10), the three  sons of Teja Singh, were returning to their house after irrigating  their land.  When they were about to enter their house the above named three accused persons along with Daroga Singh,  Tara Singh  (the other  two  appellants)  and Mohan  Singh  (Since  acquitted)  who  were  their  friends, suddenly came out of the deori, near the house of Teja Singh and Madan Singh were armed with gandasas, Charan Singh had a pistol  and  Nazar  Singh  a  barchha  with  him.  On  being instigated by  Charan Singh,  Nazar  opened  the  attack  by giving two  blows with the barchha on Harnek Singh whereupon he fell  down. Then  Tara Singh  and  Daroga  Singh  started assaulting Joginder  Singh with  their respective  gandasas.

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Nazar Singh  also gave  a barchha  blow on  his forehead and Tara Singh  another on  his left  leg with  their respective gandasas felling  him down.  Thereafter the accused persons, except Charan  Singh, caused  further injuries  to  all  the three victims  with the  weapons they  were carrying. Gurdev Kaur, wife  of Teja  Singh, then  came out  of the house but seeing the  accused went back inside and closed the shutters out of  fear.  The  accused  persons  however  unhinged  the shutters, brought her out and started beating her with their weapons resulting  in her  instantaneous death.  The accused persons then  fled away with their weapons. In the meantime, Teja Singh had also succumbed to his injuries. (c)  Jalour Singh  then went to the house of Labh Singh, the Sarpanch of the village and informed him about the incident. He then  came back  and took  his injured  brothers Joginder Singh and  Harnek Singh  to the Civil Hospital at Mansa in a tractor trolley,  leaving behind  the village  Chowkidar  to guard the  dead bodies  of his  parents. After  getting  his brothers admitted  in the  Civil Hospital, Jalour Singh went to Mansa  Police Station and lodged an information about the incident.  Shri   Arun  Chand,   (P.W.12),   Station   House Officer,recorded the  information and  after  registering  a case thereupon  left for  the  spot  accompanied  by  Jalour Singh. Reaching  there he  held inquest upon the dead bodies of Teja  Singh and  Gurdev Kaur and forwarded them for post- mortem examination.  He seized some blood-stained earth from the spot  and prepared  a sealed  parcel) in respect thereof which was sent by him for Chemical Examination. (d)  In course of the investigation the accused persons were arrested and  pursuant to  the statement  of Nazar  Singh  a barchha was recovered. Similarly, pursuant to the statements of accused  Major Singh,  Tara Singh  and Daroga Singh three gandasas were  recovered. On conclusion of investigation the police submitted  a charge-sheet  against  the  six  accused persons under  Sections 148, 302/149 IPC and 307/149 IPC and a separate  charge-sheet against  the appellant  Nazar Singh under  Section  25  of  the  Arms  Act,  1959  for  unlawful possession of the barchha. Both the cases were tried jointly and disposed of by the impugned judgment. 3.   The  accused/appellants   pleaded  not  guilty  to  the charges levelled  against them  and their  defence was  that they had been falsely implicated. 4.   To  prove   its  case   against  the   appellants,  the prosecution examined  Harnek Singh  (P.W.9), Joginder  Singh (P.W.10) and  Jalour Singh (P.W.4) to give an ocular version of the  incident. Besides,  Dr. Janak  Raj Goal (P.W.2), who had attended  to the  injuries of  Harnek Singh and Joginder Singh, Dr.  C.P. Bansal (RW 8), who had performed autopsy on the dead  bodies of  Gurdev Kaur  and Teja  Singh,  the  two investigating Officers  (P.W. 6  and 12)  and  other  formal witnesses were  examined by  the prosecution. The reports of the Chemical  Examination and Serologist were also exhibited on its behalf. 5.   On perusal  of the  impugned judgment  we find that the Social Court  placed strong  reliance upon  the evidence  of Harnek Singh  and Joginder  Singh,  two  of  the  three  eye witnesses as,  according to  it, injuries  on their persons, spoke volume  about their  presence at the spot. The Special Court next  observed that  their evidence  as to  manner  in which their  parents were killed and  they were beaten up by the  accused-appellants  stood  amply  corroborated  by  the medical evidence. 6.   We have  heard the  learned counsel  appearing for  the parties at  length and  carefully gone  through  the  entire evidence on  record, to ascertain whether the above findings

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recorded by  the trial  Court can  be  sustained.  Our  such exercise persuades  us to unhesitatingly answer the question in the  affirmative. Both  P.Ws 9  and 10  have detailed the entire prosecution  case including the specific roles played by the  four accused-appellants  in  the  killing  of  their parents as  also  in assaulting them. Though they were cross examined at  length nothing could  be elicited to contradict them. It  is, of  course, true  that both  of them  tried to suppress the  fact that their father was earlier involved in some criminal  cases but  their deviation from truth in that matter  does   not,  in  our  view,  any  way  affect  their credibility as  regards their version of the incident having regard to  the unimpeachable  evidence of  Dr. Goel (P.W. 2) who examined  them within  three hours  of the  incident and found as many as 35 and 16 injuries on the persons of P.W. 9 and P.W.  10 respectively.  The presence  of these  injuries goes a  long way  to corroborate their claim that along with their parents  they were  the victims  of attack. We further find that Dr. Bansal (P.W. 8) who held autopsies on the dead bodies of  their parents  found 30 injuries on the person of Gurdev Kaur  and 18  on the person of Teja Singh which again corroborated their  evidence. Since  the evidence of P.Ws. 9 and 10  fully supports  the prosecution  case, we  need  not discuss the   evidence of Jalour Singh (P.W.4) nor deal with the criticism made by the learned counsel for the appellants about his evidence. 7.   In assailing  the prosecution  case it was submitted on behalf of the appellants that though a number of people live in and  around the  alleged placed  of incident none of them was examined.  We do  not find  any merit in this contention for the  incident took  place in the early morning and there is no  evidence that  they of  the neighbors were present at the time of the incident. 8. Another  contention that  was raised  on  behalf  of  the appellants was that as Teja Singh had bad antecedents it was not unlikely  that he  was killed  by some  others  and  the appellants were  falsely  implicated  due  to  enmity.  This contention is  to be  stated only  to be rejected in view of the overwhelming evidence on record pointing to the guilt of the appellants.      On the  conclusions as above we dismiss the appeal. The appellants, who  are on  bail, will  now surrender  to their bonds to serve out their sentences.