1. The present appeal, under Section 378 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, is directed against the judgment and order of acquittal dated 22.1.1996 passed by the learned Sessions Judge, Kutch at Bhuj, in Sessions Case No.41 of 1994, whereby the accused has been acquitted from the charges leveled against him.
2. Facts in brief of the prosecution case are such that on 15.4.1994, in the morning, the accused had beaten his wife Laxmiben Alias Lakhiben the accused and abused her and therefore, she felt insulted and therefore, she committed suicide by setting her at fire and due to that, she received burn injuries and during the course of medical treatment, she died. Therefore, the offence under Sections 498(A) and 306 of the Indian Penal Code was registered against the accused. Thereafter, necessary investigation was carried out and statements of several witnesses were recorded. During the course of investigation, respondents were arrested and, ultimately, chargesheet was filed against them before the Court of learned Judicial Magistrate. Thereafter, as the case was exclusively triable by the Sessions Court, the same was committed to the Sessions Court, which was numbered as Sessions Case No.41 of 1994. The trial was initiated against the respondent accused.
3. To prove the case against the present accused, the prosecution has examined, in all 13 witnesses and also produced several documentary evidence.
4. At the end of trial, after recording the statement of the accused under section 313 of Cr.P.C., and hearing arguments on behalf of prosecution and the defence, the learned Sessions Judge acquitted the respondents of all the charges leveled against him by judgment and order dated 22.1.1996.
5. Being aggrieved by and dissatisfied with the aforesaid judgment and order passed by the Sessions Court, the appellant State has preferred the present appeal.
6. It is submitted by learned APP that the judgment and order of the Sessions Court is against the provisions of law; the Sessions Court has not properly considered the evidence led by the prosecution and looking to the provisions of law itself it is established that the prosecution has proved the whole ingredients of the evidence against the present respondents. Learned APP has also taken this court through the oral as well as the entire documentary evidence. She submitted that as per the evidence on record, it appears that the marriage life of accused and victim was not happy. She submitted that victim Laxmiben was conscious after getting burn injuries and she died after some treatment. Her dying declaration was recorded but same was not considered in true perspective. She further submitted that learned Sessions Judge wrongly discarded the evidence of Executive Magistrate and Dr. Acharya regarding dying declaration. She read the dying declaration and submitted that from the contents of dying declaration, it is proved that the accused meted out cruelty on her and therefore, she committed suicide. She read the oral evidence of witnesses and read the contents of dying declaration. As per her submission, the deceased committed suicide and died due to harassment caused by the accused. She therefore, submitted that due to instigation on the part of the accused, the deceased committed suicide. She therefore, submitted to allow this Appeal by quashing and setting aside the judgment and order passed by the trial Court.
7. Learned advocate Mr. Kunal Shahi appearing on behalf of respondent – accused submitted that the learned trial Court has rightly passed the judgment and order of acquittal after appreciating the evidence on record. He further submitted that there is no direct or indirect evidence against the accused, which linked the accused with the offence. Even the aspects of instigation, abetment and provocation are not established. The ingredients of Sections 107 and 108 of the Indian Penal Code are not established against the accused.
8. I have perused the record and considered the submissions made by the parties. I have perused the oral evidence of the witnesses examined by the trial Court. Looking to the evidence recored before the trial Court, it appears that there is not a single evidence, which shows that the accused caused mental or physical harassment to the deceased. From the dying declaration, it appears that as per the say of deceased, the accused abused her and therefore, she poured kerosene on herself and set her at fire, but it does not appear that the accused caused harassment to her and due to that sole reason, the deceased died. The ingredients of Section 498(A) and 306 are not established against the accused. It also appears that there is no any independent witness and only interest witnesses were examined and there are several contradictions in their evidence. From the complaint, it appears that the accused abused her and therefore, she felt bad and committed suicide and died.
9. I have gone through the judgment and order passed by the trial court. I have also perused the oral as well as documentary evidence led before the trial court and also considered the submissions made by learned APP for the appellantState. Thus, from the evidence itself, it is established that the prosecution has not proved its case beyond reasonable doubt.
10. It is also a settled legal position that in acquittal appeal, the appellate court is not required to rewrite the judgment or to give fresh reasonings, when the reasons assigned by the Court below are found to be just and proper. Such principle is laid down by the Apex Court in the case of State of Karnataka Vs. Hemareddy, reported in AIR 1981 SC 1417 wherein it is held as under:
“… This court has observed in Girija Nandini Devi V. Bigendra Nandini Chaudhary (1967)1 SCR 93: (AIR 1967 SC 1124) that it is not the duty of the appellate court when it agrees with the view of the trial court on the evidence to repeat the narration of the evidence or to reiterate the reasons given by the trial court expression of general agreement with the reasons given by the Court the decision of which is under appeal, will ordinarily suffice.”
11. Learned APP is not in a position to show any evidence to take a contrary view of the matter or that the approach of the trial court is vitiated by some manifest illegality or that the decision is perverse or that the trial court has ignored the material evidence on record.
12. In the above view of the matter, I am of the considered opinion that the trial court was completely justified in acquitting the respondent of the charges leveled against her.
13. I find that the findings recorded by the trial court are absolutely just and proper and in recording the said findings, no illegality or infirmity has been committed by it.
14. I am, therefore, in complete agreement with the findings, ultimate conclusion and the resultant order of acquittal recorded by the court below and hence find no reasons to interfere with the same. Hence the appeal is hereby dismissed. Bail bond, if any, stands cancelled. Record and proceedings to be sent back to trial Court, forthwith.
ynvyas (Z.K. SAIYED, J.)