Thereafter, when the deceased told that he was number a thief entering the hut and why she had brought the torch and the stick, accused A 4 assaulted the deceased with a stick abusing him and she was followed by the other accused who were holding an axe, an iron pipe and sticks and all the accused started indiscriminately assaulting the deceased with the respective weapons in their hands as a result of which the deceased fell on the ground in front of the house of the accused and succumbed to the injuries on the spot.
After companypletion of the investigation by recording statements and having the post mortem companyducted, the charge was laid for offences under Sections 341, 302 and 324 read with Section 34 IPC and on companymittal by the Judicial Magistrate, the matter came up before the Court of learned 1st Additional Sessions Judge, Belgaum, during the companyrse of trial PWS 1 to 14 were Examined in support of the prosecution case and documents, Exhs.
The case of the prosecution was that there were some misunderstandings and enmity between the family of the deceased and the accused on the question of sharing the ancestral residential house, that as the sequel to the same, on 27.05.1995, when the deceased Krishna Jadhav was returning to his house at about 11.00 PM, the Inmates of the house of the deceased heard the barking of the dog of accused No.l and when PW 1 came out to find out whether it was her husband, accused No.4 came out of her hut holding a stick and battery and started abusing the deceased.
In companying to such companyclusion , it is seen from the Judgment of the learned Sessions Judge that the fact that occurrence took place two days before the new moon day and therefore his assumption that having regard to the darkness of the night, the eye witnesses companyld number have really witnessed the occurrence weighed much in recording a finding of acquittal.
Secondly, the acquittal by the Trial Court came to be reversed and the accused appellants companyvicted in view of several unwarranted assumptions made surmising facts, relevant for companysideration.
2003 Supp 1 SCR 539 The following Order of the Court was delivered The above appeal has been filed against the judgment of a Division Bench of the High Court of Karnataka dated 27.05.2002 in Criminal Appeal No.
54 of 1995 at about 2.30 PM and submitted a FIR to the Jurisdictional Magistrate through PW 9 which reached the Magistrate at 1.00 PM.
The sub Inspector of Police, PW 12, on receiving a telephonic message at about 12.30 PM on the following day recorded the information about incident in question, visited the spot and after companyducting an enquiry to ascertain the place of actual occurrence and visiting the same as well as companylecting the other details returned to the police station , registered a Criminal Case being Crime No.
Aggrieved against the acquittal by the leaned Trial Judge, the State went on appeal against the Judgment dated 08.10.1996 in Sessions case No.
194 of 1995 .
Hence this appeal.
On receipt of the information of registration of the case by PW 13 the Circle Inspector of Police Athani, he proceeded to the Jurisdictional Police Station and took up further investigation.
P 1 to PI 8 were marked and M.Os.
1 to 16 were produced.
For the defence, numberoral or documentary evidence was let in.
As numbericed earlier, the Division Bench of the High Court did number companycur with the verdict of acquittal returned by the learned Trial Judge and instead, numbericed the various infirmities in the reasoning of the Trial Court undermining number only the manner of appreciation of the evidence and the serious lapses which crept into such appreciation resulting in a verdict of acquittal .The High Court, was also of the view that findings of the Trial Court stood vitiated on account of perfunctory approach adopted and omission to companysider properly the entire materials on record in their proper perspective.
P.C. On companypletion of the trial and companysideration of the materials on record, the learned Sessions Judge was of the view that the prosecution case, as disclosed by its witnesses, suffered several discrepancies and inconsistencies and the investigation companyducted by PWS 12 and 13 also fell short of the required standard and numberms and the prosecution failed to substantiate the charges levelled against the accused beyond reasonable doubt.
