Court No. - 26
Case :- GOVERNMENT APPEAL No. - 4082 of 2009 Appellant :- State Of U.P.
Respondent :- Praveen Bhatt Counsel for Appellant :- Desh Ratna Chaudhary/Ga
Hon'ble Om Prakash-VII,J.
Heard learned A.G.A. and perused the entire record.
The present appeal has been filed along with leave to appeal application against the impugned judgement and order dated 30.1.2009 passed in Special Sessions Trial No. 204 of 2001, under Sections 323, 504 and 506 I.P.C and Section 3(1)(X) SC/ST Act, P.S Tiwaripur, District Gorakhpur acquitted the respondent.
Submission of learned A.G.A. is that prosecution has proved its case beyond reasonable doubt. Witnesses examined in the matter has supported the prosecution case. Findings of the trial court are perverse. All the ingredients have been proved in the matter. Thus prayer was made to grant leave to appeal.
I have considered the submissions carefully.
In this matter, as is evident from the record, nothing is mentioned in the First Information Report to attract offence under Section 3(1)(X) SC/ST Act. What actual word was used by the accused at the time of committing the offence has also not been supported during trial. Only one witness in support of the prosecution case has been examined and statement of that witness is also shaky. There is also major contradiction in the statement of sole fact witness on material point. If the findings recorded by the trial court in the impugned judgment and order are minutely analyzed with the submission of learned AGA, no illegality or infirmity is found.
Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of S. Govindaraju Versus State of Karnataka, (2013) 15 Supreme Court Cases 315 has held as under.
"It is a settled legal proposition that in exceptional circumstances, the appellate court, for compelling reasons, should not hesitate to reverse a judgment of acquittal passed by the court below, if the findings so recorded by the court below are found to be perverse i.e if the conclusions arrived at by the court below are contrary to the evidence on record, or if the court's entire approach with respect to dealing with the evidence is found to be patently illegal, leading to the miscarriage of justice, or if its judgment is unreasonable and is based on an erroneous understanding of the law and of the facts of the case. While doing so, the appellate court must bear in mind the presumption of innocence in favour of the accused, and also that an acquittal by the court below bolsters such presumption of innocence."
In the case of Gangabhavani Versus Rayapati Venkat Reddy and Others, (2013) 15 Supreme Court Cases 298, Hon'ble Supreme Court has held as under.
"This Court has persistently emphasised that there are limitations while interfering with an order against acquittal. In exceptional cases where there are compelling circumstances and the judgment under appeal is found to be perverse, the appellate court can interfere with the order of acquittal. The appellate court should bear in mind the presumption of innocence of the accused and further that the acquittal by the lower Court bolsters the presumption of his innocence. Interference in a routine manner where the other view is possible should be avoided, unless there are good reasons for interference."
The application moved by the appellant State of U.P. to grant leave to appeal for the reason discussed herein above is not liable to be allowed. Hence, the application for leave to appeal is refused.
Since the application for grant to leave has been refused, the appeal is also not liable to be admitted and is dismissed at this stage.
Order Date :- 24.8.2018 A.N. Mishra