Public Prosecutor, High Court of A.P. vs G. Manikya Rao

Panaayya, J.—Appeal u/s 378(3) & (1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 against the acquittal of the aforesaid Respondent (accused) by the Judicial Magistrate of 1st Class of Chittoor in CC No. 204 of 1975, on bis file.

The Appeal coming on for orders as to Leave the Admission upon perusing the Petition of Appeal and the record of the evidence and proceedings before the Judicial Magistrate of 1st Class, Chittoor and upon hearing. The Public Prosecutor, for the Appellant, the Court delivered the following ORDER:

The learned Public Prosecutor contends that the order of the acquittal passed by the learned Magistrate is not justified. The learned Magistrate did not accept the evidence of P.Ws. 1 to 3 who are said to be the eye witnesses and who were examined by the prosecution.

P.W. 1 is the wife of the deceased. P.W. 3 was travelling in the bus and thus he was present at the time of the occurrence. P.W. 2 was the person that engaged the deceased and P.W. 1 in oil crushing at ''ganuga''. She was therefore said to have witnessed the occurrence. It is in the evidence of P.Ws. 1 & 2 that at about 3 a.m. that as it began to rain the deceased went to their house to get gunny bag to cover the seeds. When her husband (the deceased) came to the road while returning from the house taking a plastic paper, the R.T.C. bus driven by the accused with a high speed, hit the deceased who was thrown to a distance of 1 1/2 baras, and the front bumper portion of the bus hit the deceased and the deceased was taken to the Hospital, Chittoor in the same bus, but the deceased died at about 2.30 a.m. in the. hospital on 30.6.75. P.W. 3 also deposed that the bus was coming at a high speed and the front left side of the bus hit the deceased. Consequently the deceased fell down at a distance of 10 feet on the northern mud road portion and the bus travelled to a distance of 4 yards and stopped there P.Ws. 4 and 6, who travelled in the same bus did not support the prosecution case and they were treated by the prosecution as hostile witnesses.

The case of the accused is that he was driving, the bus slowly and was blowing horn and after the bus left Harijanawada and covered 100 yards, he heard the sound of ''daba'' and consequently he stopped the bus and found the deceased falling on the left side of the road. He took the injured to Pakala Hospital and also to the Police Station. Pakala as the doctor was absent and there he gave a report. He examined the conductor as D.W. 1. It is in the evidence of D.W. 1 that at Kukkalapalle Hari janawada42 persons boarded the bus add he asked the accused to drive the bus slowly so that he could issue tickets to all the passengers and the accused was driving the bus slowly as requested by him. Then he heard the sound ''daba'' and the accused applied brakes and stopped the bns immediately and when he and the accused got down from the bus, they saw a person lying down on the left side of the road with injuries. At the time of the accident there was heavy downfall of rain.

Ex. P-4 is the complaint given by the accused. In that the accused stated that as the deceased crossed the road from the left side to the right side of the road, the accident took place, though he was driving the bus slowly blowing the horn.

The learned Magistrate did not accept the evidence of P.Ws. 1 to 3 that the accused was driving the bus with a high speed and dashed the vehicle against the deceased while the deceased was proceeding on the northern side of the road in view of Exs. D-2 to D-5.

Exs. D-2 to D-S are contradictions brought on record from their earlier statements given before the Investigating Officer from their present version. Under Exs. D-2 to D-5. P.Ws. 1 to 3 stated that the deceased ms crossing- the road and the impact was in the middle of the road. " The learned Magistrate is therefore justified in rejecting the evidence of P.Ws. 1 to 3 which is contrary to their earlier statements before the Investigating Officer; As P. Ws. 4 and 6 stated to the effect that the deceased was crossing the road and the accident took place in the middle of the road, their evidence lends support to the case of the defence and hence the plea of the, accused cannot be taken to be false.

Thus the learned Magistrate was justified in accepting the case of the defence that the accused was driving the vehicle slowly as it was raining heavily and also as D.W. 1 (the conductor) asked the accused to drive the bus slowly to enable him to issue the tickets and the accident took place while the deceased suddenly crossed the road and there was no possibility for the accused to avoid the incident on account of the conduct of the deceased. It is now well-settled that if a person suddenly crosses a road without taking note of an approaching bus there is every possibility of his dashing against the bus without the driver of the bus becoming aware of his crossing till it was too late. In such a case it is not possible for the driver to avoid the accident even if he is driving the vehicle slowly.

Thus I hold that the learned Magistrate cannot be said to have committed any error in acquitting the accused. As I find that the order of the acquittal is not illegal or incorrect, the leave is refused.