Dharam Pal v. Karam Singh & Ors.

In the present case FIR was lodged on the statement made by Dharam Pal. He has stated that he is an Agriculturist and about 8½ killas of land belonging to Mohan Lal son of Gobind Lal was being cultivated by his family. In the revenue record i.e. khasra girdawari and jamabandies, name of complainant party had been recorded. It was stated that on 13.5.1997 when mother of complainant Sajjna Devi, aunt Badho, Basanti Devi, Santosh Rani, sister Guddi, wife of brother Daropati were sitting near the house beneath Kikkar tree, then at about 11.00 A.M., Iqbal Singh son of Balvir Singh armed with .12 bore Double Barrel Gun, Karam Singh son of Kundan Singh armed with .12 bore Double Barrel Gun, Harjit Singh son of Crl.Rev.No.582 of 2001 [2] Karam Singh armed with Gandasi, Jaswant Singh son of Karam Singh armed with Gandasa, Darshan Singh son of Kashmir Singh armed with Sotta, Puran Singh son of Dhara Singh armed with Dang came there on their tractors. Escort tractor was driven by Puran Singh, Eicher tractor was driven by Harjit Singh and Ford tractor was driven by Darshan Singh and they started ploughing the land of the complainant. Complainant along with his mother Sajjna Devi, aunt Bhado, Basanti Devi, Santosh Rani, sister Guddi and sister-in-law Daropti step ahead to save others, then Iqbal Singh gave two butt blows of the gun on the right leg and right thigh of the complainant. When Basanti Devi came forward to rescue him, then Harjit Singh gave a dang blow on her head. Iqbal Singh gave injuries with a butt blow of the gun to Basanti Devi. Jaswant Singh is stated to have given gandasa blow to Daropati which hit on her right arm. Thereafter, Jaswant Singh gave four gandasa blows from the reverse side of gandasa to Daropati which hit on her right arm, tale bone, shoulder and leg. Then Badho, his mother Sajjna Devi, sister Guddi and aunt Santosh came forward to rescue them, then Karam Singh and Iqbal Singh fired in air. Due to firing, members of the complainant family went towards their house. The accused with three tractors had cultivated the land and forcibly took possession. Injured were brought by Om Parkash and Rajinder to the Civil Hospital. Cause of injuries given was that Iqbal Singh, Karam Singh, Harjit Singh, Jaswant Singh, Darshan Singh and Puran Singh came there to take possession of the land forcibly and they stopped them and due to that reason they caused the injuries. The FIR was investigated. Report under Section 173 Cr.P.C. was submitted. The accused-respondents were tried by the Court of Sub Crl.Rev.No.582 of 2001 [3] Divisional Judicial Magistrate, Malout who vide judgment and order dated

12.1.2001 had acquitted them. Aggrieved against the same, the complainant had filed the present revision petition against acquittal. According to Mr.Girdhar, no State appeal has been filed. The trial Court relied upon the statement of PW-7 ASI Banta Singh as he has stated that he do not know who was the owner of the land. As per revenue record, Surinder Kaur widow of Rajwant Singh and Navdeep Kaur etc. were the owners to the extent of 1/12 share. PW-2 Sajjna Devi stated that owner of the disputed land was Taju Ram. The trial Court, therefore, held that story of ploughing the land of Shera Ram was false. Defence counsel before the Court below has also stated that Inder Singh son of Kundan Singh who was joined in investigation of the case, has not been examined. PW-2 Sajjna Devi further stated in the Court that she cannot tell whether Avtar Singh, Karam Singh and Resham Singh were ploughing the land. The trial Court further held that injuries on the person of injured were not corroborated by the ocular evidence as many discrepancies and contradictions were found. Court further held that PW-2 Sajjna Devi, PW-4 Guddi and PW-8 Daropati the alleged eye witnesses have not helped the prosecution case. They were declared hostile as they resiled from the statements to police. It was held in AIR 1968 Supreme Court 707 Mahendra Partap Singh vs. Sarju Singh and another, relying upon D.Stephens vs. Nosibolla, AIR 1951 SC 196, as under: “only two grounds are mentioned by this Court as entitling the High Court to set aside an acquittal in a revision and to order a retrial. They are that there must Crl.Rev.No.582 of 2001 [4] exist a manifest illegality in the judgment of the Court of Session ordering the acquittal or there must be a gross miscarriage of justice. In explaining these two propositions, this Court further states that the High Court is not entitled to interfere even if a wrong view of law is taken by the Court of Session or if even there is mis-appreciation of evidence. Again, in Logendranath Jha v. Polajlal Biswas, 1951 SCR 676 (AIR 1951 SC 316), this Court points out that the High Court is entitled in revision to set aside an acquittal if there is an error on a point of law or no appraisal of the evidence at all. This Court observes that it is not sufficient to say that the judgment under revision is “perverse” or “lacking in true correct perspective”. It is pointed out further that by ordering a retrial, the dice is loaded against the accused, because however much the High Court may caution the Subordinate Court, it is always difficult to re-weigh the evidence ignoring the opinion of the High Court. Again in K.Chinnaswamy Reddy v. State of Andhra Pradesh, 1963 (3) SCR 412 = (AIR 1962 SC 1788), it is pointed out that an interference in revision with an order of acquittal can only take place if there is a glaring defect of procedure such as that the Court had no jurisdiction to try the case or the Court had shut out some material evidence which was admissible or attempted to take into account evidence which was not Crl.Rev.No.582 of 2001 [5] admissible or had overlooked some evidence. Although the list given by this Court is not exhaustive of all the circumstances in which the High Court may interfere with an acquittal in revision it is obvious that the defect in the judgment under revision must be analogous to those actually indicated by this Court. As stated not one of these points which have been laid down by this Court, was covered in the present case. In fact on reading the judgment of the High Court it is apparent to us that the learned judge has re-weighed the evidence from his own point of view and reached inferences contrary to those of the Sessions judge on almost every point. This we do not conceive to be his duty in dealing in revision with an acquittal when Government has not chosen to file an appeal against it. In other words, the learned Judge in the High Court has not attended to the rules laid down by this Court and has acted in breach of them.” In Akalu Ahir v. Ramdeo Ram, AIR 1973 Supreme Court 2145 (V 60 C 352), Hon'ble apex Court observed as under: “This Court then proceeded to observe that the High Court is certainly entitled in revision to set aside the order of acquittal even at the instance of private parties, though the State may not have thought fit to appeal, but it was emphasized that this jurisdiction should be exercised only in exceptional cases when “there is some glaring defect in the procedure or there Crl.Rev.No.582 of 2001 [6] is a manifest error on a point of law and consequently there has been a flagrant miscarriage of justice.” In face of prohibition in Section 439(4), Cr.P.C., for the High Court to convert a finding of acquittal into one of conviction, it makes all the more incumbent on the High Court to see that it does not convert the finding of acquittal into one of conviction by the indirect method of ordering re-trial. No doubt, in the opinion of this Court, no criteria for determining such exceptional cases which would cover all contingencies for attracting the High Court’s power of ordering re-trial can be laid down. This Court, however, by way of illustration, indicated the following categories of cases which would justify the High Court in interfering with a finding of acquittal in revision: (i) Where the trial Court has no jurisdiction to try the case, but has still acquitted the accused; (ii) Where the trial Court has wrongly shut out evidence which the prosecution wished to produce; (iii) Where the appellate Court has wrongly held the evidence which was admitted by the trial Court to be inadmissible; (iv) Where the material evidence has been over-looked only (either?) by the trial Crl.Rev.No.582 of 2001 [7] Court or by the appellate Court; and (v) Where the acquittal is based on the compounding of the offence which is invalid under the law. These categories were, however, merely illustrative and it was clarified that other cases of similar nature can also be properly held to be of exceptional nature where the High Court can justifiably interfere with the order of acquittal. In Mahendra Pratap Singh, (1968) 2 SCR 287 = (AIR 1968 SC 707) (supra) the position was again reviewed and the rule laid down in the three earlier cases reaffirmed. In that case the reading of the judgment of the High Court made it plain that it had re-weighed the evidence from its own point of view and reached inferences contrary to those of the Sessions Judge on almost every point. This court pointed out that it was not the duty of the High Court to do so while dealing with an acquittal on revision, when the Government had not chosen to file an appeal against it. “In other words” said this Court, “the learned Judge in the High Court has not attended to the rules laid down by this Court and has acted in breach of them.” Similar view was reiterated by Hon'ble apex Court in Bansi Lal and others vs. Laxman Singh, (1986) 3 Supreme Court Cases 444. Again, Hon'ble apex Court, in Ramu alias Ram Kumar and others, 1995 Supreme Court Cases (Cri) 181, held that it is well settled that the revisional jurisdiction conferred on the High Court should not be lightly exercised particularly when it has been invoked by a private Crl.Rev.No.582 of 2001 [8] complainant. In Vimal Singh v. Khuman Singh and another, (1998) Supreme Court Cases (Cri) 1574 and in Bindeshwari Prasad Singh v. State of Bihar, 2002 AIR (SC) 2907, the High Court has been reminded of its very limited jurisdiction in revision against acquittal. It is well settled that unless any legal infirmity in the procedure or in the conduct of trial or patent illegality is pointed out, the revisional Court will not interfere. I find no merit in the instant revision petition to interfere while exercising revisional jurisdiction as learned counsel for petitioner has failed to point out any illegality or irregularity. The present revision petition is dismissed. February 5, 2009. JUDGE ( KANWALJIT SINGH AHLUWALIA ) RC