Madhya Pradesh High Court
Sukhdev Singh vs The State Of Madhya Pradesh on 5 March, 2024
Author: Anuradha Shukla
Bench: Anuradha Shukla
1
IN THE HIGH COURT OF MADHYA PRADESH
AT JABALPUR
BEFORE
HON'BLE SMT. JUSTICE ANURADHA SHUKLA
ON THE 5 th OF MARCH, 2024
CRIMINAL APPEAL No. 2681 of 2007
BETWEEN:-
1. SUKHDEV SINGH, S/O RAGHURAJ SINGH, AGED
ABOUT 32 YEARS, OCCUPATION:
AGRICULTURIST, R/O VILLAGE LAMKUSH, P.S.
SALEHA, DISTT. PANNA (MADHYA PRADESH)
2. BABLURAJA @ NARENDRA SINGH, S/O NATTHU
SINGH BUDNDELA, AGED ABOUT 32 YEARS,
OCCUPATION: AGRICULTURIST, R/O VILLAGE
MAJHIYARI P.S. GUNOUR, DISTT. PANNA
(MADHYA PRADESH)
.....APPELLANTS
(NONE)
AND
THE STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH
.....RESPONDENT
(BY MS. VINEETA SHARMA - PANEL LAWYER)
Reserved on : 22.02.2024
Pronounced on : 05.03.2024
This appeal having been heard and reserved for judgment, coming on
for pronouncement this day, the court passed the following:
JUDGMENT
T he appellants in this case have challenged the judgment passed on 14.12.2007 by Special Judge, Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 (for short, "the Act"), Panna, in Special Case No.15/2007. The appellants were held guilty under that judgment for the 2 offence of Section 294 IPC and sentenced with a fine amount of Rs.1,000/-, under Section 353 IPC and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for six months and fine amount of Rs.1,000/- and under Section 3(1)(x) of the Act and were sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for six months and fine amount of Rs.1,000/-, with default clause to undergo rigorous imprisonment for 20 days, 1 month and 1 month in respective defaults of payment of fine.
2. The facts of the case may be summed up as, the complainant B. P. Ahirwar was posted as Thana Prabhari, Police Station Devendranagar, and was on a patrol duty on the night of 2.10.2006; it was the day of Dussehra and besides the programme of Ravan Dahan, an orchestra programme was also orgaized in the city; the venue of this orchestra programme was near the Police Station, Devendranagar; complainant along with his police staff reached the venue of orchestra programme and found that the appellants were causing obstruction in peaceful performance; they were asked by complainant Thana Prabhari B. P. Ahirwar to come off the stage and as they did not concede, Thana Prabhari B. P. Ahirwar went on to the stage but he was pushed by appellant Sukhdev; the appellants were hurling obscene abuses to him and they also insulted him by his caste; on account of this act of appellants, obstruction was caused in the discharge of public duty of complainant; he got an FIR registered against the appellants; they were arrested and investigation was undertaken. After filing of the charge-sheet, the trial followed and under the impugned judgment, the appellants were convicted and sentenced as aforesaid.
3 . The grounds raised in this criminal appeal are that the impugned judgment is bad in law and on facts as the learned trial court believed an improbable story of prosecution and erred in holding the appellants guilty; it 3 also failed to give proper consideration to the defence version while passing the impugned judgment. It is, therefore, prayed that the appeal should be allowed and the appellants should be acquitted.
4 . The State has opposed the present appeal. Incidentally, arguments only on behalf of Panel Lawyer for the State were heard as no one appeared on behalf of appellants to argue the matter finally.
5. The record of the trial court is perused.
6. The prosecution has, in this case, relied upon the testimony of total six witnesses. B. P. Ahirwar (P.W.6) is the complainant of this case, while Constable Sanjay Pateriya (P.W.1), Constable Sadik Hussain (P.W.2) and Head Constable Hari Shankar Tiwari (P.W.5) have claimed to have accompanied the complainant to the spot and to have witnessed the incident. M. D. Namdeo (P.W.4) is the Investigating Officer, while Ramavtar Sharma (P.W.3) is an independent witness, who was declared hostile. On behalf of appellants, two witnesses, namely Brijendra Singh (D.W.1) and Vinod Gupta (D.W.2) were examined. Documents of Exs.P-1 to P-10 were produced in evidence on behalf of prosecution of which Ex.P-1 is the arrest memo, Ex.P-5 is the spot-map and Ex.P-10 is the FIR, while rest of the documents are the police statements of witnesses.
7. The appellants have been convicted for the offence of Section 3(1)(x) of the Act on the ground that they insulted the complainant in a public place, who was a member of scheduled caste category. Interestingly, the statements of B. P. Ahirwar (P.W.6) are silent on the point of his caste. Not a word has been spoken by him that he belongs to scheduled caste category. Additionally, the appellants were not asked even a single question during their examination under Section 313 of Cr.P.C. about the caste of complainant, therefore there is neither 4 any admission nor any statement regarding the fact that complainant belonged to scheduled caste category. The entire judgment does not reveal on what basis the learned trial court came to the conclusion that the complainant was a member of scheduled caste category.
8 . The record of the trial court reveals that a caste certificate of complainant allegedly issued by Tahsildar, Charkhari, district Hamirpur (U.P.), is enclosed therewith but it has not been marked in evidence. Further, it is not the original document but merely a true copy issued by Deputy Superintendent of Police, Chhatarpur. There is no evidence available on record, which would show that Tahsildar was competent to issue this certificate. The person who compared and verified it from the original document was also not examined in the case. The reason for withholding the original certificate and also for not producing it in evidence have not found place in the testimony of any prosecution witness.
9. On the basis of this analysis, it is explicitly proved that there was no trace of evidence to prove the caste of complainant and still the appellants have been held guilty of offence of Section 3(1)(x) of the Act. It has been held in the judgment of Bhagwat Singh v. State of Madhya Pradesh 2006 (1) ANJ (MP) 355 that the course to be adopted in a trial under the provisions of the Act is that the prosecution should file a certificate of caste, which is duly issued by an authorized person and an oral testimony is not sufficient to prove the said fact. Here, not even the oral evidence is available on record about the caste of complainant, leave alone the documentary evidence of certificate itself. Accordingly, in the absence of proof of caste of complainant, the conviction of appellants under Section 3(1)(x) of the Act cannot be upheld.
510. Appellants have also been convicted for the offence of Sections 294 and 353 of IPC which they have challenged in this appeal. To prove its case under these two heads, prosecution has relied upon the testimony of complainant B. P. Ahirwar (P.W.6) and eyewitnesses, namely Constable Sanjay Pateriya (P.W.1), Constable Sadik Hussain (P.W.2) and Head Constable Hari Shankar Tiwari (P.W.5). From the statements given by these witnesses, it appears that the incident occurred on the stage where the performance of orchestra was going on. According to complainant, the appellants were on stage and when complainant asked them to get down, they defied his command given under discharge of his official duty to maintain law and order in that programme. Further, when he stepped onto the stage, he was pushed by appellant Sukhdev and was given filthy abuses by both the appellants. From the statements of prosecution witnesses and also of witnesses examined by defence, it appears that there were at least five thousand people gathered in that programme when this incident occurred and not a single independent person supported the prosecution story. The lone independent eyewitness Ramavtar Sharma (P.W.3) has given a hostile testimony.
11. From the testimony of alleged eyewitnesses, namely Sanjay Pateriya (P.W.1), Sadik Hussain (P.W.2) and Hari Shankar Tiwari (P.W.5), it appears that they were not on the stage when the appellants were giving abuses to the complainant. They have claimed to be on the ground and their distance from stage was at least ten meters. A suggestion has been given by prosecution to defence witness, Brijendra Singh (D.W.1) that in the loud voice of orchestra, it was not possible to hear at the back of stage what was being said in the front side. The same analogy applies on the persons who were at least at a distance of ten meters from the stage and in a crowd of at least five thousand persons, it 6 doesn't seem probable that these eyewitnesses could hear the conversation held between the appellants and complainant on the stage. For this simple reason, the statements of alleged eyewitness, namely Sanjay Pateriya (P.W.1), Sadik Hussain (P.W.2) and Hari Shankar Tiwari (P.W.5) are not found credible regarding the commission of offence of Section 294 of IPC.
12. It is claimed by the complainant that he was pushed back by appellant Sukhdev and due to this use of criminal force, he was about to fall off the stage and, thus, an obstruction was caused in discharge of his official duty. Admittedly, he did not fall off the stage nor any injury was sustained by him. It has been admitted by alleged eyewitness Sanjay Pateriya (P.W.1) that the hand of appellant Sukhdev was caught hold by the complainant. If this version is believed, then it is natural to assume that appellant Sukhdev would have used force to rescue him and this force cannot be placed in the category of criminal force. Further, the statements of Sanjay Pateriya give impression that complainant B. P. Ahirwar was on stage and appellants were trying to get on to the stage. This version does not match with the testimony of complainant B. P. Ahirwar, who has claimed that he had asked appellant Sukhdev to come down from the stage upon which he used criminal force on the complainant.
13. The defence version is that it was Thana Prabhari B. P. Ahirwar, who climbed on the stage and was trying to molest the women performers. It has also been claimed by them that they were the members of the committee constituted to see that no chaos or disorder takes place. Strangely, eyewitnesses Sadik Hussain (P.W.2), Hari Shankar Tiwar (P.W.5) and complainant B. P. Ahirwar (P.W.6) himself have expressed their ignorance about the duty assigned to the complainant in this programme. It has been 7 claimed by Sanjay Pateriya (P.W.1) and Sadik Hussain (P.W.2) that appellants were in drunken state at the time of incident but the arrest memo of appellant Sukhdev does not mention any such fact. Further, his MLC report is available in the record of trial court though not exhibited and it does not refer to any opinion of doctor that appellant Sukhdev was under intoxication at the time of examination. Thus, the claim of these two witnesses regarding the appellants being under the intoxicating state has found no support either from the documents of prosecution nor from the oral testimony of other witnesses and even the MLC report of appellant Suikhdev does not support this allegation.
1 4 . The defence of appellants is also that they were beaten by the complainant when they objected to his misdemeanor about molesting the performers and for this, not only the oral testimony is given but also the documents of prosecution support their claim. The arrest memo, Ex.P-1, of appellant Sukhdev reveals that at the time of arrest he was in an injured condition and there were injuries on both of his knees. Similar is the MLC report of appellant Sukhdev. The prosecution has made no efforts to explain the reasons under which appellant Sukhdev sustained injuries. There is no piece of evidence available on record which would suggest that appellant Sukhdev tried to run away from the police and, in the process, sustained injuries.
15. Taking all these facts into consideration, this court is of the opinion that the prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond all reasonable doubts for the reason that there is no explanation on the part of prosecution about the injuries sustained by appellant Sukhdev, no corroboration of prosecution story by any independent witness from a crowd of almost five thousand persons present on the spot material contradictions in the testimony of interested witnesses, etc. Accordingly, the appellants are also acquitted under the charges 8 of Section 294 and 353 (354/34) IPC.
16. Resultantly, this appeal stands allowed and the appellants are acquitted of all the charges. The fine amount, if any, deposited by the appellants be refunded to them.
17. The appellants are already on bail. Their bail-bonds stand discharged.
18. Let the record of the trial court be sent back along with a copy of this judgment for information and necessary compliance.
(ANURADHA SHUKLA) JUDGE ps Digitally signed by PRASHANT SHRIVASTAVA Date: 2024.03.06 10:31:29 +05'30' Adobe Reader version: 11.0.8