APHC010427032010 IN THE HIGH COURT OF ANDHRA PRADESH AT AMARAVATI (Special Original Jurisdiction) [3521] TUESDAY, THE FIRST DAY OF JULY TWO THOUSAND AND TWENTY FIVE PRESENT THE HONOURABLE DR JUSTICE Y. LAKSHMANA RAO CRIMINAL REVISION CASE NO: 578/2010 Between: T. SHIVAPPA @ SIVA REDDY, S/O VENKATAPPA, KOTHA INDLU, PUNMGANUR TOWN, CHITTOOR DISTRICT. ...PETITIONER AND 1. PENNAMREDDI SUBBA REDDY 3 OTHERS, S/O LATE VEERA REDDY, SRIRAMAPURAM, H/O BATTAMBODDI, PANJANI MANDAL, 2. P MAHESWARA REDDY, S/O LATE VEERA REDDY, SRIRAMAPURAM, H/O BATTAMBODDI, PANJANI MANDAL, 3. P LALITHAMMA, W/O LATE VEERA REDDY, SRIRAMAPURAM, H/O BATTAMBODDI, PANJANI MANDAL, 4. THE STATE OF ANDHRA PRADESH, REP. BY ITS PUBLIC PROSECUTOR, HIGH COURT OF A.P., AT HYDERABAD. ...RESPONDENT(S): Counsel for the Petitioner: D KODANDARAMI REDDY Counsel for the Respondent(S): PUBLIC PROSECUTOR The Court made the following ORDER: The criminal revision case has been filed challenging the judgment dated 27.11.2009 on the file of the learned II Additional District and Sessions Judge, Madanapalli in S.C.No.508 of 2008 in acquitting respondent Nos.1 to 2 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 3/Accused Nos.1 to 3 for the alleged offences punishable under Section 304-B of the Indian Penal Code (for short ‘the IPC’). 2. Respondent No.1/PennamreddySubba Reddy died on 28.09.2019 and respondent No.2/P. Maheswara Reddy also died on 10.11.2017. Therefore, the case against respondent Nos.1 and 2 is abated by order dated 17.06.2025. 3. Mr. D. Kodandarami Reddy, learned counsel for the petitioner, while reiterating the grounds of the revision, argued that there was error apparent on the face of the record disbelieving the evidence of P.Ws.1 and 2, who are the parents of P. Manjula (deceased). The learned Trial Judge ignored the evidence of P.W.4 who deposed that there werequarrels ensued in between Accused No.1 and P. Manjula in order to demand of dowry. Even though the prosecution proved the guilt of respondent Nos.1 to 3 beyond reasonable doubt, the learned Trial Court failed to appreciate the evidence of the prosecution and acquitted them by not applying the presumption under Section 113-A of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 (for brevity ‘the Act’) and urged to allow the criminal revision case either finding the respondent No.3 guilty under Section 304-B of ‘the IPC’, or remand the matter for appropriate fresh adjudication. 4. On the other hand, Ms. 4. On the other hand, Ms. P. Akhila Naidu, learned Assistant Public Prosecutor argued that the learned Trial Court having appreciated the evidence of the witnesses of the prosecution on correct perspective, acquitted 3 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 the unofficial respondents under Section 235 (1) of Code of Criminal Procedure (for short ‘the Cr.P.C’) as the prosecution could not bring home the guilt of the respondents. It is further argued that there was no misreading of evidence; flagrant miscarriage of justice; violation of the procedure and urged to dismiss the criminal revision case as the presumption of innocence is doubled because of the acquittal of the respondents. 5. I have heard the arguments of learned counsel for the petitioner and learned Assistant Public Prosecutor. 6. There is no representation for respondent No.3/Accused No.3. Therefore, this Court requested Mr. MutyalaSobhanadri Naidu, learned counsel to assist the Court as Legal Aid Counsel for respondent No.3/A.3. Mr. Sobhan, learned Legal Aid Counsel submits that respondent No.3 is now aged about 76 years. The learned Trial Court acquitted the respondent Nos.1 to 3 on 27.11.2009. AlreadyAccused Nos.1 & 2/Respondent Nos.1& 2 are no more. As the learned Trial Court properly appreciated the evidence and acquitted the unofficial respondents, by virtue of acquittal presumption of innocence of respondent No.3 is doubled and this Court cannot convict the surviving unofficial respondent by invoking the powers under Section 397 read with Section 401 of ‘the Cr.P.C.,’ in view of the judgements of the Hon’ble Apex Court in Bindeshwari Prasad Singh v State of Bihar 1 whereinat Paragraph Nos.12 & 13 it is held as under: 1(2002) 6 SCC 650 4 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 “12. … We have carefully considered the material on record and we are satisfied that the High Court was not justified in re- appreciating the evidence on record and coming to a different conclusion in a revision preferred by the information under Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, Sub-section (3) of Section 401 in terms provides that nothing in Section 401 shall be deemed to authorize a High Court to convert a finding of acquittal into one of conviction. The aforesaid sub-section, which places a limitation on the powers of the revisional Court, prohibiting it from convert a finding of acquittal into one of conviction, is itself indicative of the nature and extent of the revisional power conferred by Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. If the High Court could not convert a finding of acquittal into one of the conviction directly, it could not do so indirectly by the method of ordering a re-trial. It is well settled by a catena of decisions of this Court that the High Court will ordinarily not interfere in revision with an order of acquittal except in exceptional cases where the interest of public justice requires interference for the correction of a manifest illegality or the prevention of gross miscarriage of justice.The High Court will not be justified in interfering with an order of acquittal merely because the trial Court has taken a wrong view of the law or has erred in appreciation of evidence. It is neither possible nor advisable to make an exhaustive list of circumstances in which exercise of revisional jurisdiction may be justified, but decisions of this Court have laid down the parameters of exercise of revisional jurisdiction by the High Court under Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure in an appeal against acquittal by a private party. 13. ... In the absence of any legal infirmity either in the procedure or in the conduct of the trial, there was no justification for the High Court to interfere in exercise of its revisional jurisdiction. It has repeatedly been held that the High Court should not re-appreciate the evidence to reach a finding different from the trial Court. In the absence of manifest illegality resulting in grave miscarriage of justice, exercise of revisional jurisdiction in such cases is not warranted.” 7. Further, the Hon’ble Supreme Court in D Stephens v Nosibolla2at Paragraph No.10 held as under: “The revisional jurisdiction conferred on the High Court under S. 439, Cr.P.C., is not to be lightly exercised, when it is invoked by a private complainant against an order of acquittal, against which the Govt. has o right of appeal under S. 417. It could be exercised only in exceptional cases where the interests of public justice require interference for the correction of a manifest illegality, or the 2AIR 1951 SC 196 5 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 prevention of a gross miscarriage of justice. This jurisdiction is not ordinarily invoked or used merely because the lower court has taken a wrong view of the law or mis-appreciated the evidence on record.” 8. The Hon’ble Apex Court in K Chinnaswamy Reddy v State of AP3,at Paragraph No.7 held as under: “7. It is true that it is open to a High Court in revision to set aside an order of acquittal even at the instance of private parties, though the State may not have thought fit to appeal; but this jurisdiction should in our opinion be exercised by the High Court only in exceptional cases, when there is some glaring defect in the procedure or there is a manifest error on a point of law and consequently there has been a flagrant miscarriage of justice. Sub-section (4) of S. 439 forbids a High Court from converting a finding of acquittal into one of conviction and that makes it 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 retrial when it cannot itself directly convert a finding of acquittal into a finding of conviction. This places limitations on the power of the High Court to set aside a finding of acquittal in revision and it is only in exceptional cases that this power should be exercised. It is not possible to lay down the criteria for determining such exceptional cases which would cover all contingencies. We may, however, indicate some cases of this kind which would in our opinion justify the High Court in interfering with a finding of acquittal in revision. These cases may be: where the trial court has no jurisdiction to try the case but has still acquitted the accused, or where the trial court has wrongly shut out evidence which the prosecution wished to produce. or where the appeal court has wrongly held evidence which was admitted by the trial court to be inadmissible, or where material evidence has been overlooked either by the trial court or by the appeal court, or where the acquittal is based on a compounding of the offence, which is invalid under the law. These and other cases of similar nature can properly be held to be cases of exceptional nature, where the High Court can justifiably interfere with an order of acquittal; an in such a case it is obvious that it cannot be said that the High Court was doing indirectly what it could not do directly in view of the provisions of S. 439 (4). We have, therefore, to see whether the order of the High Court setting aside the order of acquittal in this case can be upheld on these principles.” 3AIR 1962 SC 1788 6 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 9. InMahendra Pratap Singh v Sarju Singh4,at paragraph Nos.7 and 8 it is held as under: “7. In revision, the learned Judge in the High Court went into the evidence very minutely. He questioned every single finding of the learned Sessions Judge and gave his own interpretation of the evidence and the inferences to be drawn from it. He discounted the theory that the weapon of attack was a revolver and suggested that it might have been a shot gun or country made pistol which the villagers in the position of Kuldip and Sarju could not distinguish from a revolver. He then took up each single circumstance on which the learned Sessions Judge had found some doubt and interpreting the evidence de novo held, contrary to the opinion of the Sessions Judge that they were acceptable. All the time he appeared to give the benefit of the doubt to the prosecution. The only error of law which the learned Judge found in the Sessions Judge's judgment was a remark by the Sessions Judge that the defence witnesses who were examined by the police before they were brought as defence witness ought to have been cross-examined with reference to their previous statements recorded by the police, which obviously is against the provisions of the Code. Except for this error, no defect of procedure or of law was discovered by the learned judge of the High Court in his appraisal of the judgment of the Sessions Judge. As stated already by us, he seems to have gone into the matter as if an appeal against acquittal was before him making no distinction between the appellate and the revisional powers exercisable by the High Court in matters of acquittal except to the extent that instead of convicting the appellant he only ordered his retrial. In our opinion, the learned judge was clearly in error in proceeding as he did in a revision filed by a private party against the acquittal reached in the Court of Session. 8.The practice on the subject has been stated by this Court on more than one occasion, In D. Stephens v. Nosibolla, 1951 SCR 254 = (AIR 1951 SC 196), 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 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. Polailal 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 4AIR 1968 SC 707 7 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 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 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.” 10. In Ram Kishan v. Harmit Kaur5,at paragraph No.9 it is held as under: “9. It is true that the High Court as an appellate Court can set aside an order of acquittal. In doing so, the High Court has to review the evidence upon which the order of acquittal is founded. The High Court is to consider the views of the trial Judge as to credibility of the witnesses. The High Court is also to keep in view the presumption of innocence in favour of the accused and the right of the accused to the benefit of doubt. Finally the High Court is to give reasons that the acquittal was not justified. The acquittal by the Sessions Judge cannot be said to be against the evidence or in disregard of evidence. Nor can the acquittal be said to be in violation of the principles of criminal jurisdiction.” 11. InKotaiah v. G. Venkateshwara6,at paragraph Nos.19, 20 & 21 it is held as under: 5AIR 1972 SC 468 6AIR 1973 SC 1274 8 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 “19. We are of the opinion that the entire approach made by the High Court in dealing with the Criminal Revision filed against acquittal by the private party is contrary to the principles laid down in the decisions referred to above. Notwithstanding the fact that sub-section (4) of Section 439 does not authorise the High Court to convert a finding of acquittal into one of conviction, it has in fact contravened this provision by recording a finding of guilt against the accused and directing the Trial Court to convict them after a retrial. There is no question of lack of jurisdiction in the Trial Court to try the case; nor was any attack made that any evidence has been shut out at the trial. Whether the dying declaration, Ext. P. 15, by Ratnababu can be taken into account regarding the attack on Koteswara Rao, is a matter which the Trial Court was entitled to decide one way or the other. If its view was wrong, the High Court could have gone into that aspect and differed from this opinion of the Sessions Court if the State had filed an appeal against acquittal. Further the mere fact that the learned Trial Judge held that this piece of evidence is not relevant, while considering the attack on Koteswara Rao, does not amount to shutting out of evidence at the trial. In fact that evidence had already come on record. Therefore, in this case there has been no shutting out at the trial of any evidence which the prosecution wanted to adduce or the defence wanted to lead. All available evidence has been let in by both the prosecution and the accused. 20. Nor can it be stated that there has been any glaring defect in the procedure or a manifest error on a point of law and consequently leading to a flagrant miscarriage of justice. As mentioned earlier, sub-section (4) of Section 439 forbids a High Court from converting a finding of acquittal into one of conviction by an indirect method of ordering retrial when the High Court itself cannot directly convert a finding of acquittal into a finding of conviction. The High Court, in our opinion, has missed these very important limitations on its power to set aside the finding of acquittal in revision which could be done only in very exceptional circumstances. In the case on hand, the High Court was not justified in considering the evidence in such detail if it was really going to order a retrial. Such a detailed consideration of evidence and an expression of opinion about the guilt of the accused, in our opinion, has really loaded the dice against the accused when the case goes back for retrial. Much stress has been laid by the High Court that though substantive charges had been framed against the accused read with Section 34 or alternatively with Section 149 I.P.C. the Trial Court has not recorded any finding in this regard. Here again, the High Court's view is erroneous. We have already referred to the finding recorded by the Trial Court that in view of the definite case of the prosecution and the nature of the evidence, none of the accused can be held constructively liable. It is on that ground that the Trial Court has not found the accused constructively guilty. 9 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 21. We have indicated the reasons, which promoted the High Court to order a retrial. The consequence of this will be to put considerable strain on the accused who have already gone through a trial at considerable stress and expense. After going through the judgment of the learned Sessions Judge, we cannot certainly say, particularly in view of the evidence on record that either the acquittal of the twenty-two accused or the acquittal of the eight convicted accused of the rest of the charges was not justified. At any rate, it may be safely stated that the learned Sessions Judge has taken into account all the relevant circumstances. It may be that there are slight mistakes in some of the reasons given by him but the judgment asa whole shows that he has really applied his mind to the various pieces of evidence before passing the order of acquittal in the manner he has done. In the particular circumstances of this case, the interference in revision by the High Court at the instance of the private party was not justified. The two appeals filed by the convicted accused, namely, Criminal Appeals Nos. 201 and 202 of 1969 have not been dealt with by the High Court on merits. The appellants therein have a right to have those appeals heard and disposed of by the High Court according to law.” 12. InAkaluAhirv. Ramdeo Ram7,at paragraph No.10 it is held as under: “10. No doubt, the appraisal of evidence by the trial Judge in the case in hand is not perfect or free from flaw and a Court of appeal may well have felt justified in disagreeing with its conclusion, but from this it does not follow that on revision by a private complainant, the High Court is entitled to re-appraise the evidence for itself as if it is acting as a Court of appeal and then order a re-trial. It is unfortunate that a serious offence inspired by rivalry and jealousy in the matter of election to the office of village Mukhia, should go unpunished. But that can scarcely be a valid ground for ignoring or for not strictly following the law as enunciated by this Court.” 13. In Ramesh Chandra v. A.P. Jhaveri8,at paragraph Nos.6, 7 it is held as under: “6. In the case of K. Chinnaswamy Reddy v. State of Andhra Pradesh, (1963) 3 SCR 412 = (AIR 1962 SC 1788) this Court mentioned the circumstances under which an order of acquittal can be set aside in revision by the High Court and observed in this context: "We may however indicate some cases of this kind, which would in our opinion justify the High Court in interfering with a finding of acquittal in revision. These cases may be: where the trial 7AIR 1973 SC 2145 8AIR 1973 SC 84 10 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 court has no jurisdiction to try the case but has still acquitted the accused, or where the trial court has wrongly shut out evidence which the prosecution wished to produce, or where the appeal court has wrongly held evidence which was admitted by the trial court to be inadmissible, or where material evidence has been overlooked either by the trial court or by the appeal court, or where the acquittal is based on a compounding of the offence, which is invalid under the law. These and other cases of similar nature can properly be held to be cases of exceptional nature, where the High Court can justifiably interfere with an order of acquittal; and in such a case it is obvious that it cannot be said that the High Court was doing indirectly what it could not do directly in view of the provisions of S. 439 (4)." It would follow from the above that where an acquittal is based on the compounding of an offence and the compounding is invalid under the law, the acquittal would be liable to be set aside by the High Court in exercise of its revisional powers. As the acquittal of the appellant by the trial court in the present case was based upon the compounding of an offence which was not compoundable, the High Court in our view rightly set aside the acquittal of the appellant. 7. It is no doubt true that the High Court acted suo motu in setting aside the acquittal of the appellant, but that fact would not show that there was any irregularity in the procedure adopted by the High Court. The opening words of Section 439 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, viz., "in the case of any proceedings the record of which has been called for by itself or which has been reported for orders or which otherwise comes to its knowledge", as observed by this Court in the case of The State of Kerala v. Narayani Amma Kamala Devi, (1962) Supp 3 SCR 943 = (AIR 1962 SC 1530) produce the result that revisional jurisdiction can be exercised by the High Court by being moved either by the convicted person himself or by any other person or suo motu on the basis of its own knowledge derived from any source whatsoever without being moved by any person at all. All that is necessary to bring the High Court's powers of revision into operation is such information as makes the High Court think that an order made by a Subordinate Court is fit for the exercise of its powersof revision.” 14. In Amar Chand v. Shanti Bose,9 at Paragraph No.20 it is held as under: “20. Even assuming that the High Court was exercising jurisdiction under Section 439, in our opinion, the present was not a case for interference by the High Court. The Jurisdiction of the High Court is to be exercised normally under Section 439, Criminal Procedure Code, only in exceptional cases, when there is a 9AIR 1973 SC 799 11 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 glaring defect in the procedure or there is a manifest error of point of law and consequently there has been a flagrant miscarriage of the justice. The High Court has not found any of these circumstances to exist in the case before us for quashing the charge and the further proceedings.” 15. InSatyendraNath v. Ram Narain,10 at Paragraph No.16 it is held as under: “16. The High Court has thus transgressed the narrow limits of its revisional jurisdiction under Section 439 (4) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The judgment of the Sessions Court did not suffer from any manifest illegality and the interests of justice did not require the High Court to interfere with the order of acquittal passed by the Sessions Court. Any fair assessment of the evidence of the eye-witnesses would show that the acquittal of the appellants led to no miscarriage of justice.” 16. InPathumma v. Muhammad,11at Paragraph No.6 it is held as under: “…We are afraid, the learned Judge of the High Court, committed an error in making a re-assessment of the evidence and coming to a finding that the appellant No. 2 was not the illegitimate child of the respondent. We have ourselves considered the evidence on record and we agree with the learned Magistrate, who had taken much pains in analysing the evidence, that the appellant No. 2 was the illegitimate child of the respondent. The High Court in its revisional jurisdiction was not justified in substituting its own view for that of the learned Magistrate on a question of fact.” 17. Now the point for consideration is: “Whether the order in S.C.No.508 of 2008, dated 27.11.2009, passed by the learned Sessions Division Judge, Chittoor, is correct, legal, and proper with respect to its finding, sentence, or judgment, and there are any material irregularities? And to what relief?” 18. The learned Trial Court examined P.Ws.1 to 9, marked Exs.P.1 to 11 and M.O.1. There was no evidence from the side of the accused; no documents were marked. P.W.1 deposed that they had tendered 10AIR 1975 SC 580 11AIR 1986 SC 1436 12 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 Rs.1,00,000/- to Accused No.2 to meet the marriage expenses of his daughter P. Manjula with respondent No.1/Accused No.1 and he presented 140 grams of gold earnings to his daughter in connection with the marriage. Respondent No.1 and P. Manjula lived happily for three years. Accused No.1 spent the amounts given by P.W.1 at the time of marriage by the date of giving birth to his first daughter; later, he started harassing his wife Manjula to bring additional dowry and also to fetch an auto. The harassment was brought to the notice by his daughter now and then. P.W.1 visited the house of Accused No.1 and handed over Rs.20,000/- as part of the demand of additional dowry. Later, Accused No.1 started harassing his daughter for demanding additional dowry of Rs.50,000/- or Rs.1,00,000/-.After Majula gave birth to second child/Harika, P.W.1 asked his daughter Manjula any necessity of him to come over to their house in connection with demand of additional dowry by Accused No.1. However, his daughter informed him that she would herself come to his house. On the same day, his daughter came to his house in an auto from the house of Accused No.1 and narrated incidents to himand his wife that Accused No.1 hadbeat and neckedher out to bring additional dowry for them. On the same day at his request Accused No.1 visited his house in the eveningand P.W.1 told him that they were unable to pay anymore dowry due to their financial difficulties and as he had to perform marriage of two more daughters and that it was not proper to create galataharassing his daughter which might affect their reputation in the society. Accused No.1, his daughter and her children stayed in his house for three months and at that time P.W.1 13 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 promised Accused No.1to arrange auto within a month. Thereafter, Accused Nos.2 and 3 visited his house to table back Accused No.1 his daughter and her children to their village as it was an insultfor them in their village as Accused No.1 was staying in parents in-laws house. Accused Nos.2 and 3 convinced P.W.1 that they would not harass his daughter,they had taken his daughter and her two daughters to Sriramapuram. 19. After ten days, P.W.1 received phone call from Accused No.2 that his daughter was not feeling well and asked him to come to their house. Immediately, P.W.1 went from Ramasamudram village to the house of Accused No.1 where he noticed the dead body of his daughter inside the house of Accused No.1. Later, he went to police station and lodged a report vide Ex.P.1. P.W.2/T.Anjamma also testified on the similar lines with P.W.1. 20. Admittedly, P.Ws.1 and 2 had not witnessed directly when Accused No.1 or the other accused harassed Majula to bring additional dowry. P.W.3 who is neighbour of Accused No.1, deposed that Accused No.1 and deceased-Majula lived happily without ill feelings and without any misunderstandings till the demise of Majula. P.W.3 further deposed that about one and half years ago when he was sleeping in his house as tenant of Accused No.2, at about 2:00 a.m., Accused No.1 woke up him and informed that his wife Majula died in his house. Immediately he had gone to the house of Accused No.1 along with Accused No.1 and noticed the dead body of Majula in a sitting position on a cot with the support of house wall. P.W.3 had telephoned to the mother of Majula and informed about her death. P.W.3 was 14 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 declared hostile, but, nothing concrete was elicited in his cross examination except marking Section 161 of ‘the Cr.P.C’., statement of P.W.3. In the cross examination of P.W.3 he admitted that he had informed to mother of Majula about her death news as her father-P.W.1 was not available in the village has he had gone to Banglore. The evidence of P.W.3 is in no way much helpful to the case of the prosecution despite P.W.3 is the star witness for the prosecution. 21. The learned Trial Court did not believe the evidence of P.Ws.1 and 2. It was also pointed out that Ex.P.1 was prepared in the house of Accused No.1 and then went to Peddapanjani Police Station and submitted to the police, as per the version of P.Ws.1 and 2.Whereas Ex.P9/F.I.R,it was given at about 12:30 p.m. The learned Trial Court observed that the Policereceived information about the death of Majula much prior to registration of the case due deliberations taken place before registration of case under Ex.P.9. 22. The learned Trial Court pointed out that had the accused really harassed mentally and physically the deceased Majula for demand of additional dowry,the sister of P.W.1 by name Narayanamma would have been brought into picture either for negotiations as she happened to be resident of the village of the accused and she only arranged the alliance as mediator.So, the learned Trial Court opined that non examination of sister of P.W.1 Narayanamma, being a material witness, doubts the case of prosecution. The learned Trial Court did not believe the version of P.Ws.1 and 2 about the alleged harassment. It was also noticed that there was a long gap between 15 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 the alleged harassment and the demise of Majula by relying on the judgment of the Hon’ble Punjab and Haryana High Court in Maninder Singh vs. Union Territory, Chandigarh12. The learned Trial Court remonstrated that there was a vide gap of six months from the date of alleged incident of harassment to the date of suicide committed by the deceased Majula. Therefore, the presumption under Section 113-A of ‘the Act’., was not drawn by the learned Trial Court that the death might have been occurred immediately after the harassment. Section 304-B of ‘the IPC’., also lays down that the harassment shall be soon before the death of the deceased to constitute an offence under Section 304-B of ‘the IPC’. The learned Trial Court also pointed out that while holding that charge under Section 304-B of ‘the IPC’ was not established, the accused cannot be punished under Section 498-A and 306 of ‘the IPC’., as the prosecution failed to prove that the accused persons had demanded additional dowry from P.Ws.1 and 2 through the deceased P. Majula. 23. The learned Trial Court also observed that there was no specific overtactattributed against Accused Nos.2 and 3 and even by P.Ws.1 and 2 in the process of allegedly harassing the deceased-P. Manjula. The learned Trial Court observed that basing on this evidence the learned Assistant Public Prosecutor before the Trial Court had rightly considered that there was no case against Accused Nos.2 and 3. Entire allegation was against the Accused No.1 that he harassed his wife to bring additional dowry. As Accused Nos.1and 2 died, the case against them was abated as observed supra. No 122000 (4) Crimes 169 16 Dr.YLR,J Crl.R.C.No.578/2010 material let alone the substantial material available against Accused No.3/Respondent No.3. The learned Trial Court rightly acquitted Accused No.3 also. 24. As observed supra, Accused No.3 is aged about 76 years, being the mother in law of the deceased, against her no material was placed and proved. The learned Trial Court rightly acquitted the Accused No.3 under Section 235(1) of ‘the Cr.P.C’. There is no flagrant miscarriage of justice. There was no misreading of evidence. The Trial Court rightly appreciated the case against Accused No.3 and acquitted him from the charge under Section 304-B of ‘the IPC’.There are no grounds whatsoever to interfere with the acquittal. Hence, this revision case is liable to be dismissed. 25. In the result, the criminal revision case is dismissed. There shall be no order as to costs. As a sequel, Miscellaneous petitions, if any pending, shall stand closed. _________________________ DR. Y. LAKSHMANA RAO, J Date: 01.07.2025 KAS