JK Lakshmi Cement Ltd. Through The Sr. Vice President (Works), Village Malpurikhurd, Khasadih, Post v. 1 - State of Chhattisgarh Through Police Station Nandini Nagar, Dist.Durg
Case Details
ROHIT KUMAR CHANDRA Digitally signed by ROHIT KUMAR CHANDRA Date: 2025.01.18 14:59:18 +0530 1 2025:CGHC:3025 NAFR HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR CRR No. 656 of 2024 JK Lakshmi Cement Ltd. Through The Sr. Vice President (Works), Village Malpurikhurd, Khasadih, Post Ahiwara, Tahsil Dhamdha, Dist. Durg (C.G.). --- Petitioner(s) versus 1 - State of Chhattisgarh Through Police Station Nandini Nagar, Dist.Durg (C.G.). 2 - Santosh Banjare S/o Premlal Banjare Aged About 37 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) 3 - Mansingh Banjare S/o. Hiralal Banjare Aged About 32 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) 4 - Brijbai W/o. Raghunandan Sahu Aged About 35 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) 5 - Tikesh Banjare S/o. Topsingh Banjare Aged About 30 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) 6 - Khileshwar Sahu S/o. Ramnath Sahu Aged About 24 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) 7 - Dilip Kumar Sahu S/o Nohar Sahu Aged About 37 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) 8 - Jitendra Sahu S/o. Ramnarayan Sahu Aged About 24 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) 9 - Tejram Gaikwad S/o, Buddhuram Aged About 48 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) 10 - Dhannulal Sahu S/o. Manrakhan Sahu Aged About 28 Years R/o. Village Malpurikhurd, PS. Nandini Nagar, Dist. Durg (C.G.) --- Respondent(s) 2 CRMP No. 1710 of 2024 State of Chhattisgarh Through - Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) ---Petitioner(s) Versus 1 - Santosh Banjare S/o Premlal Banjare Aged About 37 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) 2 - Maansingh S/o Heeralal Banjare Aged About 32 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) 3 - Brajbai W/o Raghunath Sahu Aged About 35 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) 4 - Tikesh Banjare S/o Topsingh Banjare Aged About 30 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) 5 - Khileshwar Sahu S/o Ramnath Sahu Aged About 24 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) 6 - Dilip Kumar Sahu S/o Nohar Sahu Aged About 37 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) 7 - Jetendra Sahu S/o Ramnarayan Sahu Aged About 24 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) 8 - Tejram Gayakwad S/o Budhuram Aged About 48 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) 9 - Dhannu Sahu S/o Manrakhan Sahu Aged About 28 Years R/o Village Malpurikhurd, Police Station Nandini Nagar, District Durg (C.G.) (Cause-title taken from Case Information System) --- Respondent(s) For applicant in CRR No. 656/2024 For State/Applicant in CRMP No.1710/2024 & for respondent No.1 in CRR No. 656/2024 : :
Legal Reasoning
Mr. N. Naha Roy, Advocate Mr. Shashank Thakur, Dy Advocate General. Hon'ble Shri Ramesh Sinha, Chief Justice Hon'ble Shri Ravindra Kumar Agrawal, Judge
Decision
Order on Board 3 Per Ramesh Sinha , Chief Justice 1 7 .0 1 .202 5 1. Since both the above captioned revision petition filed by the petitioner as well as petition seeking leave to appeal filed by the State arise out of same judgment, they are clubbed and heard together and are being disposed of by this common order. 2. Heard Mr. N. Naha Roy, learned counsel for the applicant in CRR No. 656 of 2024 as well as Mr. Shashank Thakur, learned Deputy Advocate General, appearing for the State/applicant in CRMP No. 1710 of 2024 and for respondent No.1 / State in CRR No. 656 of 2024. 3. CRR No. 656 of 2024 has been filed by the petitioner under Section 397 r/w 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 with the following prayers : “It is therefore humbly and respectfully prayed that this Hon’ble Court may kindly be pleased to allow this criminal revision and set aside the impugned judgment and order of acquittal dated 22.06.2023 (Annexure A/1) passed by the learned First Additional Sessions Judge, Durg, Dist. : Durg (CG) in ST No.: 203/2023, and convict the respondents/accused persons under section 307, 435, 109, 148, 149 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, in the larger interest of justice. ” 4. Mr. N. Naha Roy, learned counsel for the applicant in CRR No. 656 of 2024 seeks permission of this Court to withdraw the instant revision petition. 4 5. Accordingly, CRR No. 656 of 2024 is dismissed as withdrawn without any further liberty. 6. CRMP No. 1710 of 2024 has been filed by the State seeking leave to leave along with I.A. No. 01 of 2024, application for condonation of delay of 266 days in filing the instant petition. 7. On due consideration and for the reasons mentioned in the said application, the same is allowed and delay in filing the petition is hereby condoned. 8. By way of this petition (CRMP No. 1710 of 2024), the State has sought leave to appeal against the impugned judgment of acquittal dated 22.06.2023 passed in Sessions Case No. 203/2013 by the Court of learned First Additional Sessions Judge, Durg, District – Durg (C.G.), whereby the learned trial Court has acquitted the respondents from the commission of offence punishable under Sections 307 (two times) / 149, 435 (two times) and 148 of IPC by giving benefit of doubt holding that the prosecution has failed to prove the charges beyond reasonable doubt. 9. The brief case of the prosecution is that, Rajkumar Banjare, resident of village Girhola under Police Station Nandini Nagar, had lodged a report on 05-04-2013 in Police Station Nandini Nagar to the effect that, he was guarding the gram crop in his field located at J.K. Lakshmi Cement Plant situated in Village Malpurikhurd, at that time a policeman in plain clothes asked him 5 the way to J.K. Lakshmi Cement Plant, so he came with him till the main gate of J.K. Lakshmi Cement on his motorcycle Passion Pro number CG 07-AC/8921 to show him the way, then at the main gate itself he and the policeman, whose name was later revealed to be Janardan Pandey, both were stopped by the agitating labourer J.K. Lakshmi of Village Malpurikhurd. They forcefully stopped him at the gate of Laxmi Cement Plant with sticks and rods and after asking for his introduction, they abused him and Janardan Pandey saying "you bastard policemen help the factory owners" and threatened to kill him and beat him and Janardan Pandey badly and also set the motorcycle of the complainant and Janardan Pandey on fire. Both of them ran away to save their lives, otherwise they would have been killed. The complainant has suffered severe injuries on his left elbow and back. He recognizes Birendra Kurre, Krishna Kumar Yadav, Puranik Thakur, Dhannu Sahu and Pawan Sahu among the people who assaulted him. On the basis of the report filed by the complainant as above, Nandini Police Station registered crime number 82/2013 against the accused under Sections 307, 435/34 of the Indian Penal Code and took up the case for investigation. 10. After due and necessary investigation, the charge-sheet was filed and the respondents/accused were put to face charges before the learned trial Court. The respondents/accused adjured the guilt. In order to prove its case, the prosecution examined as many as 11 witnesses and exhibited 24 documents in its favour. 6 11. After appreciating the evidences on record, the learned trial Court did not believe the evidence proving guilt of the respondents/ accused, and therefore, acquitted the respondents/accused from the offence charged vide impugned judgment and order dated 22.06.2023 hence, present Criminal Miscellaneous Petition has been filed seeking leave to appeal. 12. Mr. Shashank Thakur, learned Additional Advocate General appearing for the applicant/State submitted that though interference with the order of acquittal is very much limited but on the other hand the appellate Court is vested with wide powers of re-appreciation of the evidence in the matter. It is the settled position of law that, if reappraisal of the evidence goes to show that the finding of acquittal recorded by the trial Court is unjust and perverse then the appellate Court is empowered to set aside the same and reverse the order of acquittal and convict the accused appropriately. He further submitted that mere discrepancy in the statement of witness is not a sufficient ground to acquit the accused persons wherein the injured witness/victim categorically deposed regarding occurrence of incident. The learned trial Court has failed to appreciate that the name of the present accused/respondents are mentioned in the memorandum statement of co-accused persons involved in the commission of offence. The statements of the aforesaid witnesses leave no doubt about the commission of the alleged offences. He also submitted that the learned the trial Court has failed to appreciate 7 that in view of the section 30 of the Evidence Act, the confessional statement made by the co-accused persons who were tried jointly for the same offence may be taken into consideration by the court as against the present respondents. The learned trial Court has failed to appreciate the confessional statement all co-accused persons mentioned about the involvement of the present respondents in the commission of the offence. The learned trial Court has further failed to consider that on the basis of disclosure statement made by the present respondents, seizures has been made. The learned trial Cout has further failed to consider the evidence of I.O. Santuram Thakur PW- 07 who has stated in detail about the evidence collected by the prosecution regarding involvement of the respondents in the offence in question. Therefore, for the foregoing grounds amongst others the finding of acquittal recorded by the learned trial Court is unjust, improper and bad-in-law, therefore, the same is liable to be set aside. 13. We have heard learned Additional Advocate General appearing for the applicant/State and perused the record of the case including the impugned judgment of acquittal. 14. Learned Frist Additional Sessions Judge, Durg, District – Durg while acquitting the respondents has observed that as per evidence of the prosecution witnesses, it appears in this case that although the names of some of the presently tried accused from among the residents of Malpurikhurd have been taken in their testimony by the J.K. Lakshmi Cement Factory employees 8 witnesses Rajshekhar Mishra (PW-1), Santosh Kumar Lenka (PW-2), Saurabh Dutta (PW-4), Girish Tiwari (PW-8) and Sanjay Arora (PW-11), but no concrete reliable evidence has been presented as to how these witnesses identified the said villagers as the agitators or the accused who caused the incident, whereas all these witnesses have not only given contradictory statements regarding the identification of the accused, but have also unanimously presented evidence that the police did not conduct any identification proceedings with them. Contradictory statements have been made regarding the number of rioters present at the time of the incident. The present accused under consideration have been said to be among the agitators on the basis of they being villagers of Malpurikhurd, but no concrete and reliable evidence has been presented regarding what action was committed by any of the present accused under consideration in the incident, while they were involved in the dharna-demonstration for jobs in exchange of their land. On the basis of which it appears that the present accused under consideration are suspected to be involved in the incident as miscreants by these witnesses. No specific identification of the present accused under consideration has been made by these witnesses in the judicial evidence. There is a serious contradiction in the testimony of these witnesses and the testimony of the main injured person of the incident Janardan Pandey (PW-6) regarding how the incident started, because the injured witness Janardan Pandey has stated 9 to have gone to the incident spot on getting information about the incident of arson inside the plant before reaching the main gate of the incident spot, whereas other independent witnesses have stated that an argument took place with the injured Janardan Pandey and Rajkumar Banjare outside the main gate and the arson started only after their arrival. In contradiction to the statements of other independent witnesses, the injured Janardan Pandey (PW-6) himself has not identified any of the currently tried accused and has not given their names. Even though this witness is a police employee, the fact that the police did not conduct any identification proceedings with this injured police employee witness raises doubts on the police investigation. 15. It has been further observed that the prosecution has not presented any deposition of the other injured witness Rajkumar Banjare, while the prosecution was given sufficient opportunity to present the deposition of the other injured witness. The seizure of the sky blue safari suit of the injured Janardan Pandey in the seizure proceedings was done on 12-04-2013, 8 days after the incident and there was no trace or smell of kerosene in it, which also casts doubt on the case of the prosecution. The investigating officer S.R. Pathare (PW-9) himself did not include any independent witness in the investigation, the employees of the company were also included in the witnesses of seizure, while no notice was given to them in writing, no accused was arrested from the spot but no seizure was made from him on the spot, no 10 statement has been made regarding the identity of the accused. The investigating officer has also not revealed any facts in his testimony regarding how the accused were identified during the investigation. Thus, the involvement of the accused in the incident remains doubtful. The prosecution has either presented contradictory evidence regarding their involvement, or no concrete credible evidence regarding their identification or involvement of the accused in the incident, which links the accused to the incident. Hence, the prosecution has completely failed to prove its case against the present accused beyond doubt and accordingly, acquitted the accused/respondents. 16. Taking into consideration the findings recorded by the learned trial Court, acquitting the respondents/accused from aforesaid offences, we do not find any reason to allow Criminal Miscellaneous Petition seeking grant of leave to appeal. 17. Recently, applying the law governing the scope of interference in an appeal against acquittal, the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of "State of Rajasthan Vs. Kistoora Ram" reported in 2022 SCC OnLine SC 984, has held as follows:- "8. The scope of interference in an appeal against acquittal is very limited. Unless it is found that the view taken by the Court is impossible or perverse, it is not permissible to interfere with the finding of acquittal. Equally if two views are possible, it is not permissible to set aside an order of acquittal, merely because the Appellate Court finds the way of conviction to be more 11 probable. The interference would be warranted only if the view taken is not possible at all." 18. Thus, for the foregoing reasons, the CRMP No. 1710 of 2024, seeking for leave to appeal being totally devoid of merits the same is rejected. Consequently, the appeal also stands dismissed. Sd/- Sd/- (Ravindra Kumar Agrawal) (Ramesh Sinha) Judge Chief Justice Chandra