The Supreme Court today held that the failure to recover the dead body of the victim does not entitle the accused to acquittal on benefit of doubt..Such a failure is only one of the factors to be considered along with all other attendant facts and circumstance, a Bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan and Navin Sinha held..The case was an appeal against a decision of the Patna High Court which had convicted the appellant under Section 364A of Indian Penal Code and sentenced him to life imprisonment..Facts.The victim, according to the prosecution case was a school going child aged about 5-6 years. According to the allegations, he is said to have been kidnapped from the school by the co-accused Balram. The appellant and the co-accused were last seen together along with the victim..In their confessional statement both the accused disclosed that after kidnapping the child they had killed him and buried the corpse in the bed of river Saryu at Chhapra. The police did not make any effort to recover the body. The belongings of the deceased victim were recovered from the house of the appellant..Co-accused Balram who was convicted by the trial court had been acquitted by the High Court. Consequently, the appellant has been acquitted of the charge under Section 120B of IPC. The appellant, therefore, challenged his conviction under Section 364A before the Supreme Court.Arguments.The counsel for the appellant submitted that according to Prosecution Witness 10 (PW-10) who was the classmate of the deceased, co-accused Balram had kidnapped him from the school. PW-11 and PW-12, the parents of the victim had further deposed that ransom calls were made by Balram..Acquittal of the co-accused makes the conviction of the appellant unsustainable. Reliance on PWs 5, 8 and 9 that the victim was last seen with the appellant is based on a preponderance of probabilities only..PW-5 had deposed having seen the appellant along with Balram and the victim. The prosecution case against the appellant is based on circumstantial evidence with the link in the chain of events being incomplete. The failure to take any step for recovery of the dead body leaves it open to doubt whether any such incident of kidnapping had occurred or not..On the other hand, counsel for the State submitted that the acquittal of co-accused Balram is irrelevant in the nature of the evidence available against the appellant. His conviction, therefore, calls for no interference..Judgment.The Supreme Court noted that a classmate of the victim had deposed that while both of them were standing at the gate of the school at about 12 o’clock, a man with his face covered with a napkin approached the victim and told him that his father was calling him..The victim addressed him as “uncle uncle”. The man then took the school bag of the child on his shoulder, fed him ice cream and took the victim away..PW-11 and PW-12, the parents of the victim, have deposed that the acquitted accused Balram had worked as a servant in their house earlier. In the aforesaid facts, the Court observed that the significance of the victim addressing Balram as “Uncle! Uncle!”, cannot be lost sight of and unfortunately did not fall for consideration by the High Court at all. Being acquainted with the co-accused, the child naturally went along without any qualms in this background..PW-11 and PW-12 deposed that Balram had made calls on mobile demanding a ransom. Balram having worked earlier in the house of the witness, the Court held that there was no infirmity in their statement of having recognised his voice. Every individual has a distinctive style of speaking which makes identification by those acquainted possible..Identification of a known person by voice in the darkness has been well recognized in criminal jurisprudence. Even if a person tries to camouflage his voice in one call, given the limitations of human nature there will be a tendency to state certain words or sentences in an inimitable style exposing the identity, the Court stated..That being the case, the Supreme Court said that the High Court without considering these factors, unfortunately, granted acquittal to co-accused Balram opining that no recorded voice sample was available..The Court then proceeded to consider the testimony of PW -5, a liquor shop owner. He had deposed that on the day of occurrence itself the appellant and Balram had come to his shop to purchase liquor. The appellant introduced Balram as his relative. They were accompanied by a boy aged 5-6 years wearing pink shirt, blue pant, blue socks, black belt, red tie. They consumed liquor at his shop for about two hours and then left along with the child..Nonetheless, Balram was acquitted by the High Court on the reasoning that his identity as the abductor could not be established as PW-10 stated that the abductor had his face covered with a napkin and therefore the dock identification was doubtful. The same was not challenged by the State in Supreme Court..However, the Supreme Court made it clear that mere acquittal of a co-accused in the facts and circumstances of the case can be of no benefit to the appellant..The Court also adverted to the recovery of items belonging to the victim from the house of the appellant for which no explanation was offered by the appellant..Regarding the contention of the appellant about non-recovery of the dead body of the victim, the Court held that the said ground alone will not entitle an accused to acquittal..“It is not an invariable rule of criminal jurisprudence that the failure of the police to recover the corpus delecti will render the prosecution case doubtful entitling the accused to acquittal on benefit of doubt..It is only one of the relevant factors to be considered along with all other attendant facts and circumstances to arrive at a finding based on reasonability and probability based on normal human prudence and behavior.”.In the facts and circumstances of the present case, the failure of the police to recover the dead body is not much of consequence in the absence of any explanation by the appellant both with regard to the victim last being seen with him coupled with the recovery from his house of the belongings of the deceased..For the aforesaid reasons, it dismissed the appeal and affirmed the conviction of the appellant..[Read Judgment]
The Supreme Court today held that the failure to recover the dead body of the victim does not entitle the accused to acquittal on benefit of doubt..Such a failure is only one of the factors to be considered along with all other attendant facts and circumstance, a Bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan and Navin Sinha held..The case was an appeal against a decision of the Patna High Court which had convicted the appellant under Section 364A of Indian Penal Code and sentenced him to life imprisonment..Facts.The victim, according to the prosecution case was a school going child aged about 5-6 years. According to the allegations, he is said to have been kidnapped from the school by the co-accused Balram. The appellant and the co-accused were last seen together along with the victim..In their confessional statement both the accused disclosed that after kidnapping the child they had killed him and buried the corpse in the bed of river Saryu at Chhapra. The police did not make any effort to recover the body. The belongings of the deceased victim were recovered from the house of the appellant..Co-accused Balram who was convicted by the trial court had been acquitted by the High Court. Consequently, the appellant has been acquitted of the charge under Section 120B of IPC. The appellant, therefore, challenged his conviction under Section 364A before the Supreme Court.Arguments.The counsel for the appellant submitted that according to Prosecution Witness 10 (PW-10) who was the classmate of the deceased, co-accused Balram had kidnapped him from the school. PW-11 and PW-12, the parents of the victim had further deposed that ransom calls were made by Balram..Acquittal of the co-accused makes the conviction of the appellant unsustainable. Reliance on PWs 5, 8 and 9 that the victim was last seen with the appellant is based on a preponderance of probabilities only..PW-5 had deposed having seen the appellant along with Balram and the victim. The prosecution case against the appellant is based on circumstantial evidence with the link in the chain of events being incomplete. The failure to take any step for recovery of the dead body leaves it open to doubt whether any such incident of kidnapping had occurred or not..On the other hand, counsel for the State submitted that the acquittal of co-accused Balram is irrelevant in the nature of the evidence available against the appellant. His conviction, therefore, calls for no interference..Judgment.The Supreme Court noted that a classmate of the victim had deposed that while both of them were standing at the gate of the school at about 12 o’clock, a man with his face covered with a napkin approached the victim and told him that his father was calling him..The victim addressed him as “uncle uncle”. The man then took the school bag of the child on his shoulder, fed him ice cream and took the victim away..PW-11 and PW-12, the parents of the victim, have deposed that the acquitted accused Balram had worked as a servant in their house earlier. In the aforesaid facts, the Court observed that the significance of the victim addressing Balram as “Uncle! Uncle!”, cannot be lost sight of and unfortunately did not fall for consideration by the High Court at all. Being acquainted with the co-accused, the child naturally went along without any qualms in this background..PW-11 and PW-12 deposed that Balram had made calls on mobile demanding a ransom. Balram having worked earlier in the house of the witness, the Court held that there was no infirmity in their statement of having recognised his voice. Every individual has a distinctive style of speaking which makes identification by those acquainted possible..Identification of a known person by voice in the darkness has been well recognized in criminal jurisprudence. Even if a person tries to camouflage his voice in one call, given the limitations of human nature there will be a tendency to state certain words or sentences in an inimitable style exposing the identity, the Court stated..That being the case, the Supreme Court said that the High Court without considering these factors, unfortunately, granted acquittal to co-accused Balram opining that no recorded voice sample was available..The Court then proceeded to consider the testimony of PW -5, a liquor shop owner. He had deposed that on the day of occurrence itself the appellant and Balram had come to his shop to purchase liquor. The appellant introduced Balram as his relative. They were accompanied by a boy aged 5-6 years wearing pink shirt, blue pant, blue socks, black belt, red tie. They consumed liquor at his shop for about two hours and then left along with the child..Nonetheless, Balram was acquitted by the High Court on the reasoning that his identity as the abductor could not be established as PW-10 stated that the abductor had his face covered with a napkin and therefore the dock identification was doubtful. The same was not challenged by the State in Supreme Court..However, the Supreme Court made it clear that mere acquittal of a co-accused in the facts and circumstances of the case can be of no benefit to the appellant..The Court also adverted to the recovery of items belonging to the victim from the house of the appellant for which no explanation was offered by the appellant..Regarding the contention of the appellant about non-recovery of the dead body of the victim, the Court held that the said ground alone will not entitle an accused to acquittal..“It is not an invariable rule of criminal jurisprudence that the failure of the police to recover the corpus delecti will render the prosecution case doubtful entitling the accused to acquittal on benefit of doubt..It is only one of the relevant factors to be considered along with all other attendant facts and circumstances to arrive at a finding based on reasonability and probability based on normal human prudence and behavior.”.In the facts and circumstances of the present case, the failure of the police to recover the dead body is not much of consequence in the absence of any explanation by the appellant both with regard to the victim last being seen with him coupled with the recovery from his house of the belongings of the deceased..For the aforesaid reasons, it dismissed the appeal and affirmed the conviction of the appellant..[Read Judgment]
