Emperor vs Rameshwar Binjhia

Under the provisions of Section 374, Criminal P.C., the Judicial Commissioner of Chota Nagpur has referred to this Court for confirmation the sentence of death which he has passed upon Rameshwar Binjhia, aged 30, upon conviction on a charge u/s 302, I.P.C., of having on 7th October last at village. Targa committed murder of Khorain Binjhiain, by striking her with a balua. Rameshwar has preferred an appeal from jail. The reference and appeal have been heard together and will be governed by this judgment and hereinafter Rameshwar will ordinarily be referred to as the appellant.

The facts do not admit of any doubt and Mr. Chaudhuri has confined himself to the question of sentence.

The Binjhias are a tribe of semi-Hinduised aboriginals in the Simdega subdivision of the Ranchi District. All the parties live in Targa in the Kolebira thana. The deceased Mt. Khorain, a woman of 35, living with her husband close to the house of appellant, visited appellant's house about 4 o'clock on the afternoon of 7th October and presented a piece of roti to his female child Pratima who was about a year old. She did so in presence of both the parents. After the visitor has left, the child, though previously perfectly well and playing about, began to be ill after having eaten the bread given to her by Khorain.

She is said to have vomited twice and to have purged and generally to have become very ill and to have suffered from cramps and lock-jaw and eventually to have died about the time of the night meal. The appellant believing his only child to have been poisioned by their visitor, took his balua, proceeded to Khorain's house where apparently shelay asleep on the pinda and without a word dealt her at least five violent blows with the balua mostly on the left side, one at least of which was necessarily fatal.

The medical evidence proves that she died instantaneously from shock and haemorrhage as a result of the five gaping wounds described, especially the fifth which was on the left side of the neck at its upper part. The nephew and dhangar of the deceased, Tetanga, a boy of 12 years of age, who was close to Khorain, ran to the threshing floor to inform Borko, husband of the deceased. He and his brother came to his house and found her dead on the pinda in a pool of blood. The chaukidar, pahan and respectable villagers came to the place and then most of the party proceeded to the house of the appellant. They found him sitting in his angan with a balua in his hand, which had bloodstains on it as also had a dhoti which he was wearing tied round his head.

The appellant's wife was weeping in the angan and in a room of the house the little daughter Pratima was lying dead. The appellant at once stated that he had killed Khorain because earlier in the day she gave some roti to his child and the child died after eating it. The following day first information was given at the thana some 30 miles distant.

The appellant throughout adhered to his story that he had killed Khorain as she had killed (or eaten up) his little child. In the Sessions Court he added that he was distraught with grief and was for the time being mentally deranged. The viscera of the child was sent to the Chemical Examiner who failed to detect any traces of poison. There was no evidence on behalf of the defence.

The assessors all found the charge of murder established but thought that the appellant was not in his proper senses and that he was like a mad man deprived of his power of self, control by reason of the death of the child and that mercy ought to be shown to him. The learned Sessions Judge agreed with the assessors in respect of the guilt of the accused and convicted him u/s 302, In considering the question of sentence he said:

In extenuation of his crime it may be conceded that at the time be was very probably beset himself with grief and that he was also honestly convinced that his child had died as a result of eating the roti which Mt. Khorain had given her. At the same time there is no reason at all to suppose that he did not know what he was doing or that be was mentally deranged.

It seemed to him clear that Mt. Khorain was doing the child a kindness and doubtless that view is correct. He found that the case does not fall within the principle laid down in Sohrai Sao and Another Vs. Emperor, in respect of the class of cases in which the lesser sentence may be justifiably imposed upon conviction u/s 302 and therefore passed sentence of death, leaving it to those in whose hands the prerogative of mercy is placed to consider the recommendation made by the assessors. Now in the case cited the murder was committed by the deceased's husband and brother-in-law on a suspicion perhaps not well-founded, that the young woman was unchaste and the learned Judge said:

It would establish a most dangerous and immoral principle to concede to any jealous husband the right to assassinate his wife and escape the gallows. The reason for passing the lesser sentence must be express and adequate.

With this view we find ourselves in complete agreement. The learned Judge proceeded:

Such reasons are sometimes to be found in the order of mentality to which the person belongs. A simple minded ignorant savage who slaughters a person whom he really believes to be a dangerous magician may well fall into this class,

and other possible extenuating circumstances are mentioned. It is perhaps difficult to conceive of stronger extenuating circumstances than are to be found in the present instance. The child was the only child of its parents who had previously lost another daughter also at the age of about one year.

There is no doubt at all that the appellant was beset himself with grief and having connected his bereavement with the visit and gift of bread by the deceased, rushed away before he had any time to think and committed the crime of which he has been convicted. Consideration should also be had to the class to which he belongs. In view of all the circumstances, we are of opinion that the case really falls within the principle laid down in Sohrai Sao and Another Vs. Emperor, and that the reason for passing the lesser sentence is in the present in. stance express and adequate. We accordingly affirm the conviction u/s 302 but refusing the reference direct that in lieu of the capital sentence the appellant Rameshwar Binjhia do undergo transportation for life u/s 302, I.P.C.