1 2025:CGHC:14278-DB NAFR HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR ACQA No. 121 of 2014 Smt. Sukhama Wd/o Late Shri Chhabilal Aged About 47 Years R/o Village Dumardih, Police Station -Utai, District Durg (CG) ---Appellant versus 1 - Thakur Ram Thakur S/o Shri Ledagu Thakur Aged About 55 Years Caste Gond, R/o Patan Pul, Utai, Police Station -Utai, District Durg (CG) 2 - State Of Chhattisgarh Through The Station House Officer, Police Station - Utai, District Durg (CG) ---- Respondents For Appellant : Shri Jitendra Gupta, Advocate For Respondent 1 : Shri C.R. Sahu, Advocate For State/Respondent No. 2 : Shri R.N. Pusty, Government Advocate And ACQA No. 19 of 2018 State Of Chhattisgarh, Through Station House Officer, Police Station Utai, District Durg (CG) ---Appellant Versus Thakur Ram Thakur S/o Ladgu Ram Caste Gond Aged About 55 Years Caste Gond, Address- Patan Pool, Utai, Police Station Utai, District Durg (CG) ---- Respondent SUNITA GOSWAMI Digitally signed by SUNITA GOSWAMI Date: 2025.03.26 14:46:57 +0530 2 For Appellant : Shri R.N. Pusty, Government Advocate For Respondent : Shri C.R. Sahu, Advocate Hon'ble Shri Justice Sanjay S. Agrawal & Hon'ble Shri Justice Radhakishan Agrawal Judgment on Board. 25.03.2025 Per Sanjay S. Agrawal, J. 1. Since, both these appeals arise out of the common judgment dated 23.03.2013, passed by the Sixth Additional Session Judge, Durg, District Durg (CG) in Sessions trial No.76/2012, acquitting the respondent- Thakur Ram Thakur with regard to the offence punishable under Sections 450 and 302 of IPC, they have been disposed of by this common order. 2. Briefly stated the case of the prosecution is that, on 17/12/2011 at 15:00 hours, a report was lodged by one Lileshwar Kumar Banjare, who was the son of the deceased, namely, Chhabilal, before the Police Station- Utai, District Durg, alleging inter alia, that on 17/12/2011, his mother- Parvati was taking bath on the roof, while his brother, namely, Dharmendra was in kitchen and around 03:00 PM, when he proceeded towards the TV room, he saw that the accused Thakur Ram was coming out from the said room and while dashing him, ran away and, in the said room his father- Chhabilal was lying on the floor, while groaning and one knife was lying on the bed and stated further that he entered into his house and owing to some reasons, caused the alleged 3 injury to his father. It is alleged further that when he shouted and informed his brother- Dharmendra, then he came and chased him and informed regarding the alleged incident to the vicinity and he (Lileshwar) went to the village Dumardih for informing his uncle- Rakesh Banjare and brother- Shekhar Banjare and he was informed by his said uncle that on the said fateful day, i.e. 17/12/2011, around 11-12 o’clock, a quarrel had occurred between his father- Chhabilal and respondent- Thakur Ram and for taking the revenge, he (Thakur Ram) has caused the alleged injuries with the aid of knife. Thereafter, his father was taken to the Hospital, where he was declared to be brought dead. 3. Based upon the aforesaid information, an FIR Ex.P/3 was registered by the concerned Police Station against the respondent for the offence punishable under Sections 450 and 307 (ought to have 302 instead of 307 IPC) of IPC in connection with Crime No.434/2011 and, Inquest of the dead body was made vide Ex.P/13 and was sent for autopsy, which was conducted by Dr. P. Akhtar (PW-11), who opined the cause of death to be shock and hemorrhage, which occurred due to stab penetrating injury to major vessels and structure of his body vide his postmortem report (Ex.P/9). Clothes of the respondent were recovered vide Ex.P/6, based upon his disclosure statement (Ex.P/5), while the alleged weapon “knife” was recovered from the spot vide Ex.P/1 and was sent for its query report. After completion of the usual investigation, charge-sheet was submitted before the Judicial Magistrate First Class, Durg for the offence publishable under Sections 450, 307 and 302 of IPC and the matter was thereafter, committed to 4 the Court of Sessions for its trial, where the charge has been framed as mentioned herein-above, which was denied by the respondent and claimed to be tried. 4. In order to bring home the guilt of the respondent, the prosecution has examined as many as 14 witnesses, and exhibited 18 documents, while none was examined by the respondent in his defence. 5. The trial Court, after considering the evidence led by the prosecution arrived at a conclusion that the prosecution has failed to prove that the respondent is involved in connection with the crime and accordingly, acquitted him from the commission of the alleged offence and, being aggrieved, the instant appeals have been preferred. 6. Learned counsel appearing for the appellants submits that the finding of the trial Court holding that the respondent is not involved in connection with the alleged crime, is apparently contrary to the materials available on record, in as much as the evidence led by the prosecution, particularly the statements of the deceased’s sons, namely, Lileshwar (PW-3) and Dharmendra (PW-6) as also the statement of his wife Smt. Sukma (PW-4), have not been scanned in its proper manner and, thereby, erred in acquitting him as such. 7. On the other hand, learned counsel appearing for the respondent has supported the impugned judgment of acquittal as passed by the trial Court. 8. We have heard learned counsel appearing for the parties and perused the entire record carefully. 5 9. Before considering the propriety of the judgment impugned passed by the trial Court, acquitting the respondent from the commission of the alleged offence, it would be appropriate to see the approach, which is required to be adopted, while dealing with an acquittal appeal, in the light of the principles laid down by the Supreme Court in the matter of Mallappa and Others Vs. State of Karnataka, reported in (2024) 3 SCC 544, wherein, it has been observed in this regard at paragraphs 25 to 29 as under :- “25. We may firstly discuss the position of law regarding the scope of intervention in a criminal appeal. For, that is the foundation of this challenge. It is the cardinal principle of criminal jurisprudence that there is a presumption of innocence in favour of the accused, unless proven guilty. The presumption continues at all stages of the trial and finally culminates into a fact when the case ends in acquittal. The presumption of innocence gets concretized when the case ends in acquittal. It is so because once the Trial Court, on appreciation of the evidence on record, finds that the accused was not guilty, the presumption gets strengthened and a higher threshold is expected to rebut the same in appeal. 26. No doubt, an order of acquittal is open to appeal and there is no quarrel about that. It is also beyond doubt that in the exercise of appellate powers, there is no inhibition on the High Court to re-appreciate or re-visit the evidence on record. However, the power of the High Court to re-appreciate the evidence is a qualified power, especially when the order under challenge is of acquittal. The first and foremost question to be asked is whether the Trial Court thoroughly appreciated the evidence on record and gave due consideration to all material pieces of evidence. The second point for consideration is whether the finding of the Trial Court is illegal or affected by an error of law or fact. If not, the third consideration is whether the view taken by the Trial Court is a fairly possible view. A decision of acquittal is not meant to be reversed on a mere difference of opinion. What is required is an illegality or perversity. 27. It may be noted that the possibility of two views in a criminal case is not an extraordinary phenomenon. 6 The ‘two-views theory’ has been judicially recognized by the Courts and it comes into play when the appreciation of evidence results into two equally plausible views. However, the controversy is to be resolved in favour of the accused. For, the very existence of an equally plausible view in favour of innocence of the accused is in itself a reasonable doubt in the case of the prosecution. Moreover, it reinforces the presumption of innocence. And therefore, when two views are possible, following the one in favour of innocence of the accused is the safest course of action. Furthermore, it is also settled that if the view of the Trial Court, in a case of acquittal, is a plausible view, it is not open for the High Court to convict the accused by reappreciating the evidence. If such a course is permissible, it would make it practically impossible to settle the rights and liabilities in the eyes of the law. 28. In Selvaraj v. State of Karnataka (2015) 10 SCC 230,(SCC pp. 236-37,para 13) “13. Considering the reasons given by the trial court and on appraisal of the evidence, in our considered view, the view taken by the trial court was a possible one. Thus, the High Court should not have interfered with the judgment of acquittal. This Court in Jagan M. Seshadri v. State of T.N. [(2002) 9 SCC 639] has laid down that as the appreciation of evidence made by the trial court while recording the acquittal is a reasonable view, it is not permissible to interfere in appeal. The duty of the High Court while reversing the acquittal has been dealt with by this Court, thus: (SCC p.643, para 9) “9...…We are constrained to observe that the High Court was dealing with an appeal against acquittal. It was required to deal with various grounds on which acquittal had been based and to dispel those grounds. It has not done so. Salutary principles while dealing with appeal against acquittal have been overlooked by the High Court. If the appreciation of evidence by the trial court did not suffer from any flaw, as indeed none has been pointed out in the impugned judgment, the order of acquittal could not have been set aside. The view taken by the learned trial 7 court was a reasonable view and even if by any stretch of imagination, it could be said that another view was possible, that was not a ground sound enough to set aside an order of acquittal.” 29. In Sanjeev v. State of H.P. (2022) 6 SCC 29 4 , the Hon’ble Supreme Court analyzed the relevant decisions and summarized the approach of the appellate Court while deciding an appeal from the order of acquittal. It observed thus: (SCC p.297, para 7) “7. It is well settled that: 7.1. While dealing with an appeal against acquittal, the reasons which had weighed with the trial court in acquitting the accused must be dealt with, in case the appellate court is of the view that the acquittal rendered by the trial court deserves to be upturned (see Vijay Mohan Singh v. State of Karnataka (2019) 5 SCC 436 and, Anwar Ali v. State of H.P. (2020) 10 SCC 166 ). 7.2. With an order of acquittal by the trial court, the normal presumption of innocence in a criminal matter gets reinforced (see Atley v. State of U.P. (1955) SCC OnLine SC 51) 7.3. If two views are possible from the evidence on record, the appellate court must be extremely slow in interfering with the appeal against acquittal (see Sambasivan v. State of Kerala (1998) 5 SCC 412)” 10. In view of the aforesaid principles laid down by the Supreme Court, it is necessary to examine the facts and the evidence as led by the prosecution in order to ascertain as to whether the findings recorded by the trial Court, acquitting the respondent from the commission of the alleged offence, are perverse or would deserves to be upheld. 11. From perusal of the record, it appears that the respondent has been 8 charge-sheeted with regard to the offence punishable under Sections 450, 307 and 302 of IPC. According to the prosecution, the deceased Chhabilal was assaulted by the respondent with the aid of knife on account of some altercation, which took place prior to the occurrence of the alleged incident and, at that particular time, his son, Lileshwar has seen him running away from the house and when he shouted, his brother- Dharmendra came and chased him. But, when he (Lileshwar) was examined as PW-3, it was stated at para 2 while deviating from his alleged report, by saying that, he has seen the respondent assaulted his father with the aid of knife on his abdomen and while throwing the alleged weapon (knife) has fled away towards the Bus Stand. Further of his statement would show that on the fateful day, none was there in the said TV room, while his brother- Dharmendara (PW-6), who reached home at 02:40 PM, has seen that the respondent- Thakur Ram was standing near the door of his house and thereafter, he (Dharmendra) went to the TV room and after some time, he heard the noise of his brother- Lileshwar that the said respondent is running away after assaulting the father, then he chased him (Thakur Ram) and caught hold of him near the Bus Stand and his mother- Smt. Sukma has also followed him and, when he asked the respondent as to why he has assaulted his father, he however, ran away while pushing him and when he returned home, the father was groaning, then he was brought to the Sector-9 Hospital, where Doctor has declared him dead. It reveals further from his testimony, particularly para 4, that when he returned home from the School, one Indra Kumar Mahipal was sitting on the Sofa in the said TV room and stated further 9 that he has not heard any kind of noise. It reveals further from his evidence that when he returned home from the School, his mother- Sukma Bai, the first wife of his father, had gone for bath and was not at home, while his another mother, namely, Parvati Bai, i.e. the second wife of his father, was also not at home. However, when said Sukma (PW-4) was examined, it was stated that when she reached home at 03:00 PM after taking bath from the pond (Talab), Parvati Bai was also at home. It reveals further from her testimony, particularly para 5, that when she was going for drying the clothes on the roof, while crossing the said TV room and when she climbed hardly 6-7 steps, has heard the noise of her son- Lileshwar. It, thus, appears that at the relevant point of time, she was there, but has not seen the said Indra Kumar Mahipal, who was found to be there in her house, as revealed from the statement of her son- Dharmendra (PW-6) and as far as said Indra Kumar Mahipal (PW-1) is concerned, he, however, has not stated that he was in the said TV room. There are, thus, discrepancies in their statements and would be not safe to place reliance on their testimonies. 12. It is to be seen further that none of the prosecution witnesses have seen the respondent entering into the house of the deceased. Pertinently, to be noted here further that the knife, alleged to have been used for the commission of the alleged crime, seized from the spot vide Ex.P-1 was, however, not found to be sent for its query report as revealed from para 7 of the statement of Dr. P.Akhtar (PW- 11), who categorically stated that the alleged knife was not brought to him for the query report. The prosecution has, thus, even failed to 10 establish the fact regarding use of the alleged knife for the commission of the alleged crime. In absence of any cogent and reliable evidence led by the prosecution, it would, thus, be unsafe to attribute the respondent for the commission of the alleged crime. The trial Court has, therefore, not committed any illegality in acquitting the respondent from the commission of the alleged crime, so as to call for any interference in these appeals. 13. The appeals, being devoid of merits, are accordingly, dismissed. Sd/- Sd/- (Sanjay S. Agrawal) (Radhakishan Agrawal) Judge Judge sunita