Punjab-Haryana High Court
Darshan Singh & Ors vs State Of Punjab on 1 June, 2016
Author: A.B. Chaudhari
Bench: A.B. Chaudhari
CRA-S-1834-SB-2010 1
IN THE HIGH COURT FOR THE STATES OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT
CHANDIGARH
CRA-S-1834-SB-2010
Date of decision: June 01, 2016.
Darshan Singh and others
... Appellants
v.
State of Punjab
... Respondent
CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE A.B. CHAUDHARI
Present: Mr. Jitender Chahal, Advocate for the appellants.
Mr. M.S. Randhwara, Additional Advocate General, Punjab.
1. Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ?
2. Whether to be referred to the Reporters or not ?
3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest?
A.B. Chaudhari, J. (Oral):
Being aggrieved by the judgment and order dated
7.7.2010 passed by Additional Sessions Judge (Ad hoc), Fast Track
Court, Rupnagar in Sessions Case No.RT-26 of 8.3.2007/5.12.2007,
by which all the appellants were convicted for offences under
Sections 148, 341, 307, 326, 323, 452 IPC and were sentenced to
undergo RI for 3 years for offence under Section 307 IPC + fine, RI
for 6 months for offence under Section 148 IPC, RI for one month for
offence under Section 341 IPC and RI for 3 years for offence under
Section 326 IPC, RI for 6 months for offence under Section 323 IPC
and RI for 2 years + fine for offence under Section 452 IPC, the
present appeal was preferred by 5 accused-appellants.
FACTS:
Briefly stated, the prosecution case is that a telephonic
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message was received in the Police Station Kharar from PGI
Chandigarh about a medico-legal case whereupon ASI Nirmal Singh
with his staff, went to PGI Chandigarh but could not record the
statement of Sikander Singh, being unfit. He, thereafter proceeded
to the Civil Hospital, Kharar and recorded the statement of
Sukhwinder Singh. In his statement, he stated that he with his
grand-father Hakam Singh, brother Ranjit Singh and wife Sarabjit
Kaur were sleeping at the roof of their house when at about 10 p.m.,
the door of his house was knocked. Upon opening the door, they
found the appellants who asked as to where was Ranjit Singh. When
they were told that Ranjit Singh along with his wife was sleeping on
the roof, all of them went to the roof of the house. Darshan Singh
and Jitti caught hold of Ranjit Singh and started beating him. On
raising raula, they ran away. Thereafter, the complainant along with
Ranjit Singh, Sikander Singh and his uncle Kuldip Singh proceeded
to the police station to lodge the report. After lodging the report when
they were returning and were near the house of Sadhu Singh and
Mohinder Singh, appellant Darshan Singh armed with kirch, appellant
Jitti armed with danda, appellant Bhapla armed with danda and
Parwinder Singh armed with danda and one more person were
standing there. Appellant Darshan Singh raised a lalkara that they
should teach a lesson to the complainant party for going to the Police
Station and gave a kirch blow on the person of Ranjit Singh on his
abdomen while others gave danda blows on the person of
Sukhwinder Singh. Appellant Darshan Singh thereafter gave kirch
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blow on the person of Sikander Singh on his abdomen. Thus Ranjit
Singh and Sikander Singh received injuries. Thereafter, all the
accused person ran away with their respective weapons. It is after
this that the injured were admitted to the hospital.
The FIR was lodged; investigation was undertaken.
Statements of the witnesses were recorded. Thereafter, the challan
was filed against all the accused persons. The learned trial Judge
heard the evidence and thereafter convicted the appellants, as stated
above. Hence, this appeal.
ARGUMENTS:
In support of the appeal, Mr. Jitender Chahal, learned
counsel for the appellants, assailing the judgment and order
vehemently argued that there is no recovery of weapon, namely, kirch
in this case nor the same was identified by any of the witnesses in
the court. According to him, there is no further evidence about the
existence of blood stains on any of the weapons, so also chemical
analyzer's report in order to corroborate the prosecution evidence.
He further submitted that evidence of PW1 Sukhwinder Singh, PW2
Ranjit Singh and PW3 Sikander Singh is of the interested witnesses
and due to enmity, they deposed against the appellants. Their
evidence should not have been accepted by the trial Judge in the
absence of any independent evidence or corroboration in the form of
scientific evidence which the prosecuting agency failed to collect. It
is submitted that the prosecution has not at all found out or disclosed
before the court the genesis of its case nor any motive has been
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brought forward by the prosecution. He, therefore, submitted that the
entire prosecution case is doubtful and the benefit of doubt should
have been extended to the appellant-accused persons. According to
him, the facts and the evidence themselves show that there was no
agreement or meeting of mind of the accused persons inter se to
arrive at a conclusion that there was unlawful assembly. He then
submitted that the name of accused Harpreet is not in the FIR or
anywhere in the police statement under Section 161 Cr.P.C. or even
before the court. Harpreet was involved deliberately by the
prosecution and therefore, he deserves to be acquitted. In the
alternative, he submitted that all the accused-appellants should be
sentenced to the period they have already undergone in view of the
long lapse of the period, i.e., almost a decade from the date of
incident.
Per contra, learned Additional Advocate General, Punjab
supported the impugned judgment and order and submitted that the
prosecution proved its case beyond any shadow of doubt by
producing three eye witnesses, namely, PW1 Sukhwinder Singh,
PW2 Ranjit Singh and PW3 Sikander Singh. According to him, the
evidence of three eye witnesses as well as injured cannot be
brushed aside since the same is supported by the medical evidence.
Law does not require that the evidence of interested witnesses
should be discarded outright. In this case, there are three eye
witnesses and they are injured. No other reason has been
suggested as to how the injuries were caused to them. According to
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him, there is corroboration inter se amongst the witnesses, so also
from the medical evidence supporting their version before the court.
He fairly stated that Harpreet 's name is not in the FIR but he was
identified by only one witness, namely PW3 Sikander Singh and
therefore, there is no reason to acquit him. He opposed the
alternative plea for reduction of sentence looking to the nature of
injuries and the sentence of only three years given by the trial Judge
for the serious offence under Section 307 IPC. He, therefore, prayed
for dismissal of this appeal in entirety.
CONSIDERATION:
I have seen the evidence of three eye witnesses who
were injured, namely, PW1 Sukhwinder Singh, PW2 Ranjit Singh and
PW3 Sikander Singh, so also their cross examination. I have seen
the reasons given by the trial Judge for recording the order of
conviction. Upon hearing the learned counsel for the rival parties at
considerable length, at the outset I find that the prosecution case
about the unlawful assembly by the accused persons is required to
be disbelieved and negated. The reason is that Harpreet, appellant
No.5 herein, was never said to be part of the unlawful assembly
when the FIR was lodged, inasmuch as his name was not mentioned
in the FIR. Not only that, except for PW3 who stated that he
identified him only by face in the court for the first time, there is
hardly any evidence against him, either to identify him as a member
of unlawful assembly at the time of the incident or for any overt act
on his part during the incident. In the wake of such quality of
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evidence, as stated above, it must be held that the appellant accused
Harpreet was not the member of the unlawful assembly that had
gone to the house of the injured. Consequently, there were only four
persons. It falls short of one person to form unlawful assembly. I
thus hold that the prosecution failed to prove that there was any
unlawful assembly. As a sequel, conviction recorded by the trial
Judge for offences under Sections 148 and 149 IPC will have to be
set aside. Having thus held that there was no unlawful assembly of 5
members, as above, now I proceed to make assessment of the
evidence led by the prosecution in this appeal.
It is seen from the records that appellant Darshan Singh
was carrying deadly weapon, namely, kirch. Not only that, he gave
stab blows by means of kirch to Sikander Singh and Ranjit Singh. I
quote para 12 and 13 from the judgment of the trial court to show the
injuries suffered by them, which read thus:-
"12. Similarly, the prosecution has examined PW-8 Dr. Sanad.
He deposed that on 5.8.2006 he medico-legally examined Sikandar
Singh s/o Didar Singh and found the following injuries on his
person:
1. Two stab would 3x1 cm each approximately 4 cm and 8 cm
from the midline on left side of abdomen, with omental prolapse.
2. 5x1 cm lacerated wound over the scalp.
He further deposed that the patient was operated
immediately and the following injuries were found intra operatively:
1. There was blood mixed with bile and fecal matter in the
abdominal cavity.
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2. Five puncture wounds in the small intestine starting from DJ
flexure to Jejunum approximately 1.3 x 1 cm each.
In his opinion the nature of the injuries collectively was
dangerous to life and were recent in nature i.e. within few hours.
He proved the MLR Ex. PW8/A. He also proved his opinion
regarding fitness of injured to make the statement as Ex.PW8/B.
He also proved the opinion of Dr. Sonia Ex. PW8/C and that of Dr.
Tanmay Tiwary ex.PW8/D regarding fitness of the injured.
13. Similarly, the prosecution has examined PW-10 Dr. Naresh
Kumar Medical Officer. He deposed that on 5.8.2006, at about
2.30 AM he medico-legally examined injured Ranjit Singh son of
Baljinder Singh and found the following injuries on his person:
1. Swelling with reddish contusion 3x3 cm on the left side of
the forehead near the anterior hair line. Advised X-ray.
2. An lacerated wound 0.5x0.5 cm on the temporal region left
side, 4 cm, above the upper border of the pinna. Fresh bleeding
was present. Skin deep. Advised x-ray.
3. An lacerated wound 0.5x0.25 cm skin deep on the neck of
left side 2cm behind the pinna alongwith multiple scratches near
this injury. Fresh bleeding was present.
3-A. An diffuse swelling extending lower border of the left eye
with reddish blue contusion present. Swelling is about 4 x 2.5 cm.
Advised x-ray.
4. A reddish abrasion irregular 1.5 x 0.5 cm with linear abrasion
1 x 0.2 cm present on the right lower quadrant of the abdomen.
5. A reddish abrasion 0.5 x 0.5 cm in the epigastric region.
6. An interrupted linear abrasion 6 x 0.25 cm present on the
lateral aspect of the left fore-arm jut below the elbow joint. Oozing
of blood was present."
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Perusal of the six injuries to Ranjit Singh shows that they
are not serious injuries. Therefore, for the assault on Ranjit Singh, in
my opinion, offence under Section 324 IPC only is proved by the
prosecution so far as the appellants No.1 to 4 are concerned.
Perusal of the injuries to Sikander Singh shows that injury
No.1 is described as external injury and injury No.2 is described as
internal injury which shows that the kirch that was utilized by Darshan
Singh was utilized with sufficient force as a result of which 5 puncture
wounds were caused to small intestine and in particular the jejunum
portion. It is thus clear that the injury caused to the small intestine
which resulted in puncture wound was really dangerous and had
Sikander Singh not received the medical aid, the injury could have
been fatal. Looking to this aspect of the matter, I think the trial court
did not commit any error in convicting Darshan Singh for offence
under Section 307 IPC. Analyzing the submission made by learned
counsel for the appellants on the evidence of PW1 and PW3, I find
that their evidence is cogent, trustworthy and most natural and they
being the injured witnesses, there is no reason for disbelieving their
evidence. Their cross examination has put no dent to their sworn
testimony before the court and on the contrary, their evidence is
trustworthy. All the other accused have also been held guilty by the
trial court for the offence under Section 307 IPC but I find that it was
only Darshan Singh who had given the stab blows on the vital part of
the body, namely, abdomen by means of a dangerous weapon like
kirch. As other persons did not have the sharp weapons but were
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only armed with sticks or dandas, had caused hurt, they except
Darshan Singh, have to be held to be guilty under Section 324 read
with Section 34 IPC and not under Section 307 IPC. However,
Darshan Singh cannot be given the said benefit as he knew that the
weapon which he was using for carrying out the assault, was a
dangerous weapon and, therefore, the only requisite offence which
can be attributed to Darshan Singh for holding him guilty is the
offence under Section 307 IPC. I therefore confirm the finding
holding Darshan Singh guilty of offence under Section 307 IPC. In
so far as other appellants, No.2 to 4 are concerned, I think that they
should be held guilty of offences under Sections 324, 341, 452 and
323 IPC. Appellants No.2 to 4 have undergone sentence of about six
months and I think looking to the lapse of a period of about a decade,
they should be sentenced to the sentence they have already
undergone rather than pushing them in jail at a late stage particularly
when they are not shown to have criminal antecedents. In that view
of the matter, I make the following order:-
ORDER
[i] Crl. Appeal No.S-1934-SB of 2010 is partly allowed; [ii] Crl. Appeal No.S-1934-SB of 2010 filed by Darshan Singh is dismissed. He is allowed four weeks time to surrender to serve the remainder of the sentence. [iii] Crl. Appeal No.S-1934-SB of 2010 filed by appellants No.2 to 4 is partly allowed and they are acquitted of the offences under Sections 148, 149, 307, 326 IPC and their 9 of 10 ::: Downloaded on - 04-06-2016 00:10:56 ::: CRA-S-1834-SB-2010 10 conviction is modified by convicting them for the offences under Sections 324, 341, 452 read with Section 34 IPC and they are sentenced to undergo sentence which they have already undergone.
[v] Crl. Appeal No.S-1934-SB of 2010 filed by appellant No.5 Harpreet is allowed and he is acquitted of the offence for which he has been convicted. [vi] Bail bonds stands discharged.
[ A.B. Chaudhari ] June 01, 2016. Judge kadyan 10 of 10 ::: Downloaded on - 04-06-2016 00:10:56 :::