Rangi Ram vs State of Haryana

S.D. Bajaj, J.

Kali Ram deceased was a tailor working at Guhna. Ram Partap and Raj Pal are his two sons. They are both also in tailoring business at Kaithal and allegedly get back home in the night after doing the day''s work at Kaithal. Parmeshwari is the widow of deceased and mother of his two children aforesaid. Sadhu Mahajan had a shop in Guhna adjoining the house of Rangi accused which he sold to Kali Ram allegedly in the year 198182. Feeling that asimmediate neighbour of the vendor Sadhu Mahajan, he had preferential right of its purchase, Rangi was nursing a grudge against Kali Ram on this score.

On the night intervening between June 16, 1986 and June 17, 1986, Parmeshwari widow of Kali Kam, her two sons named Ram Partap, Raj Pal and her deceased husband''s nephew Rajinder were sleeping in the house while Kali Ram was sleeping outside his shop. Around 1:30 A.M. on June 17, 1986 Parmeshwari felt pain in her stomach. She used to cure it with huqa puffs. Finding that there was no tobacco in her house available, she went to the shop of her husband Kali Ram for obtaining it from him. While appocaching the shop Parmeshwari saw Rangi accused giving gandasi blows to the deceased and returned home crying Mar diya, lut gai". The three males in her house got awakened on hearing her cries and accompanied the widow of the deceased to his shop. From a distance they observed the accused fleeing from the place of occurrence with his gandasi. Reaching the place of occurrence they saw Kali Ram deceased profusely bleeding from the multiple gandasi injuries inflicted upon him by the accused. Ultimately Kali Ram succumbed to the injuries on their arrival. Leaving Raj Pal by the side of the dead body, Ram Partap along with Partap Singh Ex. Sarpanch and Dalel Singh, Member Panchayat, went to Police Station Saddar, Kaithal, for making report of the occurrence. A.S.I. Mange Ram recorded the formal First Information Report at 7.50 A.M. and the said report reached the Ilaqa Magistrate at 10.15 A.M. with due promptitude.

Vide his assailed judgment dated November 27, 1986 learned Sessions Judge, Kurukshetra, convicted accused Rangi Ram of the commission of the offences under section 302 of the Indian Penal Code and sentenced him to undergo imprisonment for life. Feeling aggrieved Rangi Ram has come up in Criminal Appeal No. 662D.B. of 1986, to this court. We have heard Shri Nand Lal, Advocate, learned counsel for the appellant, Shri R.S. Tacoria, Advocate, for the State and have carefully gone through the record or Sessions case No. 16 of 1986 against the accused appellant.

It has been urged by the learned counsel for the accusedappellant that the alleged motive was inadequate, that the version in regard to Parmeshwari'' P.W. 2 having seen the occurrence is improbable, that the allegation of the cries of the solitary eyewitness Parmeshwari Devi made on seeing the accused killing Kali Ram with gandasi, having not awakened immediate neighbours of Kali Ram sleeping outside their respective shops on the way back after seeing the occurrence, is simply incredible and clearly indicates that two sons and a nephew of the deceased were all called from Kaithal to get a blind murder of the deceased traced, that the allegations of the accused marking an extrajudicial confession of his guilt to Tekka Ram P.W. 5, disclosure statement Exhibit PC to the police on getting the gandasi Exhibit PA discovered in pursuance of it are all faked ones and that the accusedappellant, a widower, has been falsely implicated in the case so that Permeshwari Devi and her sons could comfortably live in his house, which admittedly adjoins the shop of Kali Ram deceased.

Learned trial court rightly observed in Para 12 of its assailed judgment that the evidence of Tekka Ram P.W. 5 in regard to the accused making an extrajudicial confession of his gnilt, in murdering Kali Ram deceased with a gandasi, did not carry any conviction because the witness did not narrate before the learned court of Session the actual words used by the accused while making the alleged extrajudicial confession. Even after excluding this piece of evidence against the accused there is abundant cogent, convincing and credible evidence available on record which has rightly been availed of by the learned trial court for returning, the finding of guilt against the accusedappellant.

In the first place there is the eyewitness account of the occurrence brought on record by P.W. 2 Parmeshwari Devi widow of the deceased who saw Rangi Ram accused giving gandasi blows to her husband Kali Ram while sitting on his bed laid just outside the shop of the deceased which adjoins the residential house of the accused. Her version of the occurrence is corroborated to all material particulars from the medical opinion of P.W. I Dr. K.B. Jain, Medical Officer, Civil Hospital, Kaithal, who stated that he had found as may as 16 incised wounds on the person of the deceased at the time of postmortem examination which could be caused with gandasi Exhibit P. I discovered by the accused vide his disclosure statement Exhibit P.G. allegedly made by him to the police during investigation. `Gadda'' spread on the cot of Kali Ram deceased and the `Baan'' of the cot aforesaid were both reported by the expert of the Forensic Science Laboratory in their report Exhibit PM/1, Exhibit PM/2 and Exhibit PM/3 to be stained with human blood. Resgeslae deposition of Ram Partap P.W. 3 who accompanied his mother to the place of occurrence and saw the accused running away from the place of occurrence after killing his father and carrying the gandasi (weapon of offence) with him also lends credence to the prosecution version.

As held in State of U.P. v. Hakim Singh and others, A.I.R. 1990 Supreme Court 184, the occurrence having taken place at dead of night, widow and son of the deceased are the most natural witnesses of the alleged occurrence. Even otherwise also it is not the law that the evidence of an interested witness should be equated with that of a tainted evidence or that of an approver so as to require corroboration as a matter of necessity. The evidence of an interested witness does not suffer from any infirmity as such but the Courts require as a rule of prudence, not as a rule of law that the evidence of such witnesses should be scrutinised with a little care. Once that approach is made and the court is satisfied that the evidence of interested witnesses have a ring of truth such evidence could be relied upon even without corroboration. Indeed there may be circumstances where only interested evidence may be available and no other, e.g. when an occurrence takes place at midnight in the house when the only witnesses who could see the occurrence may be the family members. In such cases it would not be proper to insist that the evidence of the family members should be disbelieved merely because of their interestedness. The testimony of eyewitnesses cannot be rejected merely because they are interested and partisan witnesses.

Again proof of motive satisfies the judicial mind about the likeliyhood of the authorship but its absence only demands deeper forensic search and cannot undo the effect of evidence otherwise sufficient. Motives of men are often subjective, submerged and unamenable to easy proof that courts have to go without clear evidence thereon if other cinching evidence exists. In the case in hand, the accused being immediate neighbour of Sadhu Mahajan who allegedly sold his shop adjoining the house of accused to Kali Ram deceased, the accused could reasonably be expected to nurse a grudge against the deceased on this score. The eyewitness account of the occurrence having been relied upon on the basis of independent corroborative evidence of it adduced by prosecution, the mere absence of a strong motive for committing murder is of no assistance to the accused. In view of the independent testimony the question of motive becomes more or less academic.

There is thus no merit in the appeal and the same is hereby dismissed.