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CASE NO.: Appeal (crl.)  846 of 1997

PETITIONER: Vidhya Devi & Anr.                                        

RESPONDENT: State of Haryana                                          

DATE OF JUDGMENT: 20/01/2004

BENCH: Doraiswamy Raju & S. B. Sinha

JUDGMENT: J U D G M E N T

D. Raju, J.

       The above appeal has been filed against the decision dated 26.11.1996 of  a learned Single Judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court in Criminal Appeal  No.180-SB of 1995, whereunder the conviction of the appellants under Section  304-B, IPC, and the sentence of seven years R.I. each, in addition to the  payment of fine of Rs.1,000/- each, came to be affirmed.  The case of the  prosecution was that the marriage of the deceased Satyawati took place with A- 5, Kuldeep, about six years prior to the date of occurrence; that they started living  at Rohtak, i.e., at the house of her husband, who himself was living in joint family  with his father A-4, Puran Mal, and others; that all the accused started harassing  and torturing the deceased for want of more dowry and the manner of torture  included even physical beating.  About 1-= years after the marriage, the  deceased gave birth to a male child and though her parental side brought certain  gifts, the accused were not satisfied both with reference to their quality and  quantity and on that also they tortured the deceased Satyawati.  On 27.7.1993,  about four months before the death of Satyawati, a demand was made for a sum  of Rs.20,000/- as further dowry and for not complying with the demand, the  deceased was not only tortured by physical beating but was said to have been  locked in a room for four days from where she managed to escape and reached  the house of her sister Krishna, in the same place.  Thereupon, the sisters called  their mother Misri Devi and a written complaint in Ex.PO was said to have been  lodged with the Police through the Deputy Commissioner and on the said  complaint, the husband and father-in-law of the deceased were arrested and  taken to the Police Station.  Both of them were said to have apologized to the  complainant party and then a compromise was said to have been effected and  reduced into writing as Ex.PO/1, which was also attested by the Police Officer in  Ex.PO/2 and thereafter the deceased was brought back to the house of her-in- laws.  About four months thereafter on 16.11.1993 at about 10.30 A.M. when the  husband Kuldeep and father-in-law Puran Mal were away, the A-1, her mother- in-law by name Vidhya Devi, caught hold of the deceased by her hands on her  back and Mina Devi, the daughter of Vidhya Devi, sprinkled Kerosene on the  deceased and then A-2, the son of A-1 and A-4 by name Harish Kumar, set her  ablaze.  After she caught fire, her hands were said to have been freed on which  she was said to have jumped into a water tank and raised alarm which attracted  a front door neighbour by name Kalawati, who was said to be the eye witness for  the occurrence including the catching hold of hands by Vidhya Devi, sprinkling of  kerosene by Mina Devi and setting her ablaze by Harish.  Thereupon, those  three accused were said to have pulled her out from the water tank and put her  on a cot stating that no treatment will be given and she would, in the normal  course, die of the burns.  At that stage, the neighbour Kalawati was said to have  approached the sister of Satyawati, by name Krishna, in the Office of Deputy  Commissioner, where Krishna was said to be working and she brought her  mother Misri Devi from Jind and then Misri Devi was said to have taken the  injured to the Medical College and Hospital, Rohtak.

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       The Medical Officer was said to have sent an information to the Police  Station of the admission of Satyawati in the Hospital as a burn case and when  the Police Officer went to the Hospital after collecting the necessary information,  the Medical Officer attending on her appears to have opined that she was not fit  to make the statement and when in the evening the Police Officer again  contacted the Doctor with a written request Ex.PC, he obtained his opinion and  that she was declared to be fit to make the statement.  When the Police Officer  contacted the Magistrate to record a dying declaration of the injured, the  Magistrate seems to have declined stating that the Police Officer must first  register the case and at that stage the Police Officer contacted the injured  Satyawati and recorded Ex.PD, the statement, in the course of investigation to  the effect that all the five accused had been harassing her for want of more  dowry and that she was set ablaze by the three accused, noticed above.  The  victim ultimately died at 11.30 a.m. on 20.11.1993.  After completing the  formalities of the investigation such as FIR, recoding of statement, inspection of  the place of occurrence, inquest and conduct of post mortem and obtaining  Medico Legal Opinion, the five accused, noticed above, were charged under  Sections 498-A, 304-B, 302 read with Section 34 of IPC.  In support of the  prosecution case, about 14 witnesses were said to have been examined, which  included the Investigating Officers, PW-11 who claimed to be an eye witness to  the occurrence, PW-13 the mother of the victim, the Doctors who attended on her  and the Doctor who conducted the post mortem examination.  For the defence,  two witnesses were examined, besides examination of the accused under  Section 313, Cr.P.C., and on consideration of the materials on record, the  learned Trial Judge by his Judgment dated 9.2.1995 in Sessions Case No.15 of  1994 convicted the appellants for offence punishable under Section 304-B, IPC,  on the view that there was direct and substantial evidence against them though  in respect of the other offences these accused and the remaining three accused  in respect of all offences were found not guilty.  The challenge made to the  veracity and validity of the dying declaration recorded by the Investigating Officer  was also repelled by the learned Trial Judge.

       Aggrieved, the appellants pursued the matter on appeal and as noticed  above, the High Court affirmed the conviction and sentence recorded by the  learned Trial Judge.

       The learned counsel for the appellants strenuously contended, while  reiterating the stand taken before the courts below, that the neighbour by name  Kalawati, who claimed to be an eye witness to the occurrence, could not be  believed as having been present at that time at the place of occurrence and that  the other materials on record were not sufficient to bring home the guilt of the  accused.  It was also contended that in the light of the acquittal of the other  accused, the same norms and standards of appreciation should have been  extended while considering the case of the appellants as well and they should  have been also acquitted.  While attacking the dying declaration Ex.PD, which  was really the statement of deceased recorded by the Police Officer on  17.11.1993 in the presence of the Medical Officer attending on the patient, it was  contended that having regard to the nature and extent of the burns the deceased  could not have been in a fit and proper condition to give the statement or sign the  same and in any event the so-called statement was not shown to have been  recorded in the presence of the Doctor.  The authenticity of the statement was  also challenged on the ground that it was a got up statement and not really one  made in the normal course and no reliance can be placed on the same.  The  further plea on behalf of the appellants was that the requirements of Section 304- B have not been properly substantiated to warrant conviction of the appellants  under the said provisions of law.  Per contra, the learned counsel for the  respondent-State justified the judgments of the courts below by adopting the  reasoning of the learned Judges in the courts below.   

       We have carefully considered the submissions of the learned counsel  appearing on either side.  In our view, the acquittal of the other accused, except  the appellants, on the ground of absence of any direct and substantial evidence  against them cannot be relied upon as basis for a claim to project the case for  acquittal of the appellants against whom and as to the role played by them there  were ample materials as noticed, analysed and ultimately found the appellants

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guilty.  The strained relationship between parties and also the harassment of the  deceased for not bringing further dowry and not complying with the demands  made on the deceased stood sufficiently substantiated on the basis of the  indisputable material in the shape of complaint before the Police therefor as well  as the compromise which came to be signed also by Puran Mal, Bimla (the in- laws of the deceased) Krishna, Vidhya Devi as well as by Om Prakash,  Jagdamba, Raghbir Singh, Pawan Kumar, Bhupinder Kumar and attested by the  Police Officer also.  So far as the challenge made to the dying declaration  recorded, though no doubt by the Police Officer concerned, the evidence of PW- 3, Dr. Krishan Kumar, who not only opined that the deceased was in a fit state of  mind to make the statement but present when the statement was recorded and  that the said statement was signed by the deceased Satyawati in token of its  correctness adds credibility to the same and consequently involvement of the  accused-appellants and the respective role played by them in having the  deceased killed, remains firmly established by concrete and sufficient material  and the findings in this regard concurrently arrived at by both the courts below  are not shown to suffer from any infirmity whatsoever to call for our interference.   

       So far as the contention raised on the scope and applicability of Section  304-B, IPC, to the case on hand and as to the facts found established are  concerned, it may be seen that Section 304-B, IPC, was mainly introduced  having regard to the increasing menace of dowry deaths by burns and bodily  injury or otherwise than under normal circumstances and the insufficiency of the  existing provisions of law to combat them effectively and also with the laudable  object of curbing the menace of dowry deaths with a firm hand.  In order to attract  Section 304-B, IPC, the Court must be satisfied that (i) the death of a woman  must have been caused by burns or bodily injury or otherwise than under normal  circumstances; (ii) such death must have occurred within seven years of her  marriage; (iii) soon before her death, the woman must have been subjected to  cruelty or harassment by her husband or by relatives of her husband; (iv) such  cruelty or harassment must be for or in connection with demand for dowry; and  (v) such cruelty or harassment is shown to have been meted out to the woman  soon before her death meaning thereby the proximity in point of time and not too  remote or stale in point of time and relevance.  The legislature has also taken  care to enact a statutory presumption as to dowry death by inserting Section  113B to The Indian Evidence Act, 1872 to the extent that when the question is  whether a person has committed the dowry death of a woman and it is shown  that soon before her death such woman has been subjected by such person to  cruelty or harassment for, or in connection with, any demand for dowry, the Court  shall presume that such person had caused the dowry death.  The materials on  record in this case amply prove, as noticed supra, that soon before her unnatural  death, which took place within seven years of her marriage, she was subjected to  cruelty and harassment both for and in connection with a demand for dowry and  that the facts brought on record further prove the existence of a proximate and  live link between the effect of cruelty related to dowry demand and the concerned  death.  The expression ‘soon before’ is a relative term which requires to be  construed in the context of specific circumstances of each case and no hard and  fast rules of any universal application can be laid down by fixing any time limit.

       What is the periphery of the word ‘Dowry’ came to be considered by this  Court in the decision in Pawan Kumar & Ors. Vs. State of Haryana [(1998) 3  SCC 309] and in the teeth of the extended definition and meaning of the term as  brought about by the Criminal Law (Second Amendment) Act, 1983 (Central Act  46 of 1983) w.e.f. 19.11.1986 the earlier meaning confining and limiting the same  to the time at or before the marriage got enlarged and extended even to the  period after the marriage and that there be no need to also show any agreement  for the payment of such dowry to make it punishable as an offence.  The plea on  behalf of the appellants to the contrary does not merit to be countenanced in our  hands.                         For all the reasons stated above, we find no merit in the challenge to the  conviction of the appellants and the sentence also cannot be said to be so  unreasonable as to call for our interference in this appeal.  The appeal fails and  shall stand dismissed.

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