New Delhi : The Supreme Court has upheld convictions in two cases of murders in Madhya Pradesh, including one in Indore in 1998, while acquitting one of a 1993 rape, giving him benefit of doubt.
All three cases were disposed of by the Bench of Justices V Gopala Gowda and Adarsh Kumar Goel in the judgments pronounced on Tuesday and made available to Press on Thursday.
In Indore case, the Bench went by the evidence of the 15-year old Sunderlal to dismiss the appeal of Gul Singh alias Guliya and his two accomplices against the life sentence pronounced on them by an additional sessions judge of Indore in October 1999 and upheld by the High Court for murder of a woman and kidnap and rape of another.
Stating that the child’s evidence “inspires confidence and corroborated by other evidence on record,” the Bench said evidence of child witness cannot be rejected unless it is tutored or unreliable.
In another case of Bhind in M.P., the Court allowed the MP Government, setting aside the judgment of the Gwalior Bench of the High Court and restoring one of the trial court, i.e. additional sessions judge of Bhind, convicting Shivshankar of murder and sentencing him to life imprisonment and fine.
The case relates to a quarrel on the Holi festival day in March 1999 in front of the house of the convict who brought out his brother’s licensed gun from the house and fired a shot killing one Satish who was just an onlooker and not involved in the altercation. The High Court had acquitted the convict on the ground that the incident occurred suddenly and without premeditation.
In the third case, the Apex Court set aside conviction of one Munna who was awarded seven years of rigorous imprisonment for rape om April 1993, holding that circumstances taken as a whole create doubt about the correctness of the prosecution and hence he is given benefit of doubt.
Munna and his accomplice Sahab Singh alias Mutta entered the house of a married woman and both raped her threatening her with a knife and fled. Sahab was acquitted by the trial court while sentencing Munna, relying on the woman’s version, supported by her husband and the village Kotwar. The Supreme Court took note of Munna getting an anticipatory bail because the woman exonerated him through an affidavit three days after lodging the FIR.
