Supreme Court - Daily Orders
Basavaraju Hanamappa @ Hanamantappa vs State Of Karnataka By R.R.Police ... on 8 July, 2014
h5 IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION
CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 2112 OF 2009
BASAVARAJU, s/o HANAMAPPA
@ HANAMANTAPPA Appellant(s)
VERSUS
STATE OF KARNATAKA BY
R.R.POLICE STATION Respondent(s)
ORDER
This appeal has been filed against the judgment of the High Court of Karnataka dated 8.7.2008 in Criminal Appeal No. 604 of 2003 by which the High Court of Karnataka confirmed the conviction and sentence of the appellant herein for offences under Section 376, 420 and 506(2) IPC awarded by the Sessions Court, Haveri.
The offence took place on the night of 14th September, 1999. PW 11 was the victim and the prosecutrix who was aged about 16 years on the date of the occurrence. The appellant herein was tried and convicted by the learned Sessions Judge, Haveri by judgment dated 22.2.2003 in Sessions Case No. 90 of Signature Not Verified 2001 on all counts. He was awarded sentence of 7 years rigorous imprisonment for the offence under Digitally signed by Deepak Mansukhani Date: 2014.07.10 17:31:54 IST Reason: Section 376 IPC apart from the fine, 3 years’ RI for the 1 offence under Section 420 IPC apart from fine and 1 year R.I. for the offence under Section 506(2) IPC. All the sentences were directed to run concurrently.
The appellant unsuccessfully approached the High Court in Criminal Appeal No. 604 of 2003 which appeal came to be dismissed by the High Court on 8 th July, 2008 by the impugned judgment.
At the outset, it may be mentioned that the appellant admittedly has served full sentence and he was released on 13th April, 2014.
However, learned counsel for the appellant submitted that the appellant was working as a teacher in a Government primary school and in view of the conviction recorded in the Sessions Case, his service was terminated and, therefore, the matter is required to be examined on merits and in the event the appeal succeeds, the appellant would get back his job.
We, therefore, thought it fit to examine the matter. It is a fact that all the witnesses who were cited as independent witnesses by the prosecution to support the version of PW 1 turned hostile. Inspite of such a fact, both the Courts below recorded the conclusion that the appellant is guilty of various offences charged against him.
2Learned counsel for the appellant submitted that the conviction is required to be interferred with on the following grounds:-
(i) that there is a delay of 8 days in lodging the report;
(ii) that there is no medical evidence to establish that the victim suffered rape;
(iii) that the uncle of the victim had some previous enmity against the appellant and, therefore, a false case has been lodged against the appellant herein.
It appears from the evidence on record that in view of the fact the appellant made a promise that he would marry the victim, the report was not immediately lodged. It is only after the appellant did not keep his promise and got married to PW 15 on 20 th September, 1999, the victim and her family decided to lodge the report. That explanation was accepted by both the Courts below and we do not see any reason to record a different conclusion.
Coming to the second submission of the lack of medical evidence, in view of the delay in lodging the report and consequential delay in subjecting the victim for medical examination, the absence of medical evidence is considered inconsequential by both the Courts below. We agree with the same.
3Coming to the last submission that the family of the victim particularly the uncle of the victim(PW 13) had some prior enmity with the appellant is also held to be inconsequential by both the Courts below.
In our view, both the Courts below rightly held so assuming that there is some ill-will between the appellant and PW 13, it would be difficult to imagine that PW 11 would make a complaint of rape just to please her uncle incurring a great deal of social stigma.
In the circumstances, we see no merit in the appeal.
The appeal is dismissed.
.............................J. (J. CHELAMESWAR) .............................J. (A.K. SIKRI) NEW DELHI JULY 08, 2014.
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ITEM NO.103 COURT NO.10 SECTION IIB
S U P R E M E C O U R T O F I N D I A
RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS
Criminal Appeal No(s). 2112/2009 BASAVARAJU, s/o HANAMAPPA @ HANAMANTAPPA Appellant(s) VERSUS STATE OF KARNATAKA BY R.R.POLICE STATION Respondent(s) (with appln.(s) for ex-parte stay and office report) Date : 08/07/2014 This appeal was called on for hearing today.
CORAM :
HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE J. CHELAMESWAR HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE A.K. SIKRI For Appellant(s) Mr. R. Venkatappa Naik, Adv.
Mr. Raghavendra Naik, Adv. Mr. Dhirendra Kumar, Adv.
Mr. Rameshwar Prasad Goyal ,Adv.
For Respondent(s) Ms. Anitha Shenoy ,Adv.
UPON hearing the counsel the Court made the following O R D E R The appeal is dismissed in terms of the signed order.
(DEEPAK MANSUKHANI) (INDU BALA KAPUR) COURT MASTER COURT MASTER
(Signed order is placed on the file) 5