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Head Note

Criminal Laws  - Criminal Trial

Circumstantial Evidence - Appreciation of Evidence - Following tests to be clearly established: (i) The circumstances from which an inference of guilt is sought to be drawn, must be cogent and firm; (ii) Those circumstances should be of a definite tendency unerringly pointing towards guilt of the accused; (iii) The circumstances taken cumulatively should form a chain so complete that there is no escape from the conclusion that within all human probability the crime was committed by the accused and none else; and (iv) The circumstantial evidence in order to sustain conviction must be complete and incapable of explanation of any other hypothesis than that of the guilt of the accused and such evidence should not only be consistent with the guilt of the accused but should be inconsistent with his innocence.

Indian Penal Code,1860  - Section 302 , Section 376 (2) , Section 201 , The Indian Evidence Act, 1872  - Section 53 , Section 54

Appeal against Acquittal - Rape - Murder - Circumstantial Evidence - Appreciation of evidence - Imputation of bad character on accused - High Court rightly held that such evidences are not relevant - By discussing Sections 53 and 54 of the Act, 1872 High Court held that the accused neither tried to prove his previous good character, nor the said fact was in question - An earlier instance of attempt to rape by the accused, as deposed by the mother of the prosecutrix (PW4), aunt of the deceased (PW5) and brother of the deceased (PW6), is not established at any stage of the trial - These witnesses are not only interested witnesses but they themselves stated that their evidence is hearsay - Prosecution neither produced any complaint/FIR nor any record was shown that any such incident occurred - Thus, the prosecution squarely failed to impute bad character upon the accused - Further, the motive is also not firmly established against the accused.

Indian Penal Code,1860  - Section 302 , Section 376 (2) , Section 201

Rape/Murder - Circumstantial Evidence - Appreciation of evidence -Alibi - Prosecution has failed to link the accused with the incident though it has the responsibility to present a chain of event - Accused's culpability could have been established if the blood samples were tested and matched, the recovery of underwear is not proven to be that of the deceased - Otherwise, the recovery was unnatural and did not adduce confidence - There were material discrepancies in the statements of the prosecution witnesses - Testimonies of the interested witnesses, namely, PW3, PW4, PW5 and PW28 clearly show that they materially improvised from their earlier depositions - Accused also examined two defence witnesses who stated that the accused was attending function in some other village on the fateful night - High Court went into each and every material aspect of the case, examined at length the deposition of the witnesses and rightly held that the links which are collected by the prosecution have not at all been proved by any cogent evidence and, therefore, it is difficult to hold that it was the accused who committed rape upon the deceased and thereafter killed her.

Topic(s)-Rape - Murder - Circumstantial Evidence - Acquittal