New Delhi: The Supreme Court has modified the life imprisonment sentence of a murder accused to culpable homicide and sentenced him to ten years, saying the prosecution could not establish his common intention with the other three accused to cause the murder of the victim.
The top court affirmed the life imprisonment awarded to three accused in the murder case.
The Supreme Court's judgment came on an appeal filed by four accused against the concurrent conviction under Section 302 read with Section 34 and sentence for life imposed by the trial court as well as the Telangana High Court.
"For the reasons to follow, while we confirm the judgment and sentence with respect to A-1, A-2 and A-4, the conviction and sentence of A-3 is however modified to Section 304 Part II and sentenced to 10 years imprisonment," said a bench comprising Justices BR Gavai and PS Narasimha, in a judgment delivered on February 6.
The top court said both the courts have mechanically drawn an inference against A3 merely based on his presence near the scene of offence and his familial relations with the other accused. "A reading of the judgment and order passed by the trial as well as the High Court would indicate that neither the prosecution or defence, nor the court, have focussed on the role of A-3 as evidenced by the oral and documentary evidence. There is nothing to attribute A-3 with the intent to murder the deceased," said Justice Narasimha, who authored the judgment on behalf of the bench.
The accused, 1 to 4, belong to the same family, and the deceased, come from the same village in Telangana. The incident had occurred in November 2001. It was alleged that the sister of the deceased and the wife of A-4 were political aspirants and they contested the 'Gram Panchayat' elections. In these elections, the sister of the deceased succeeded and the wife of A-4 lost and that, unfortunately, led to animosity between the two groups, eventually leading to the murder of the deceased.
The common account about A3 is that he hit the deceased on the head with a stone. Accused No. 1 continued the attack and hit the deceased with an axe and, largely, the witnesses recounted a consistent narrative of the attack, identifying the weapons used and the roles of each accused.
The bench noted that while the axe was used by other accused to assault the deceased, A3 never took the axe. "The cumulative circumstances in which A-3 was seen participating in the crime would clearly indicate that he had no intention to commit murder of the deceased for two clear reasons. Firstly, while every other accused took the axe used by A1 initially and contributed to the assault with this weapon, A-3 did not wield the axe at any point of time. Secondly, A-3 only had a stone in his hand, and in fact, some of the witnesses said that he merely threatened in case," said the bench.
"Under these circumstances, we hold that A-3 did not share a common intention to commit the murder of the deceased. Additionally, there is no evidence that A-3 came along with the other accused evidencing a common intention," noted the apex court.
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