1 2025:CGHC:59019-DB NAFR HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR CRA No. 1026 of 2022 Myaram Gilhare S/o Late Manrakhan Gilhare Aged About 56 Years R/o Village Dhaneli, Police Station Mujgahan,, District : Raipur, Chhattisgarh ... Appellant versus State Of Chhattisgarh Through - Station House Officer, Police Station Mujgahan, District : Raipur, Chhattisgarh ... Respondent For Appellant : Mr.Arun Kumar Shukla, Advocate For Respondent : Mr.Shashank Thakur, Deputy Advocate General Hon'ble Shri Ramesh Sinha, Chief Justice Hon'ble Smt. Rajani Dubey, Judge Judgment on Board Per Ramesh Sinha , Chief Justice 05/12/2025 1. This criminal appeal preferred under Section 374(2) of the Cr.P.C is against impugned judgment of conviction and order of sentence dated 31.03.2022 passed in Sessions Trial No.230//2021 by the learned Third Additional Sessions Judge, Raipur, District Raipur, C.G., whereby the appellant has been convicted and sentenced BABLU RAJENDRA BHANARKAR Digitally signed by BABLU RAJENDRA BHANARKAR 2 as under:- Conviction Sentence U/s 302 of the IPC Life Imprisonment and fine of Rs. 500/- with default stipulation. 2. Case of the prosecution in brief is that on 21st November, 2020, Rupendra Todar, the complainant, informed the police at Mujgahan station about the sudden and unnatural death of his brother, Kiran Todar vide Ex.P-11. The police were informed that his uncle (Fufa), Mayaram Gilhare, had struck Kiran with an axe. Upon reaching the Gouthan area of the village with villagers Vinay Gendre, Sarpanch Sandeep Verma, Deputy Sarpanch Mohan Chakdhari, and Deepak Ratre, they found Kiran lying in a pool of blood in the watchman's room. There were injuries on his head and neck, with blood on the wall. It appeared he had died on the spot. There had been a prior dispute between Kiran and Mayaram over watchman duties, as Mayaram was not performing his duties properly due to drinking, leading the Sarpanch to suspend him. The dispute had escalated in the days leading up to the incident. The police registered the FIR vide Ex.P-12. Inquest was prepared over the body of the deceased vide Ex.P-2. Memorandum statement of the appellant was recorded vide Ex.P-3 and on the basis of his memorandum statement, axe was seized at the instance of the appellant from the place of incident vide Ex.P-4. Bedsheet and bloodstained soil were seized from the spot vide Ex.P-5. The appellant was arrested on 21.11.2020 vide arrest 3 memo Ex.P-6. Spot map was prepared by the patwari vide Ex.P-10. Investigating officer also prepared the spot map vide Ex.P-13. Dead body of the deceased was sent for postmortem to the Medical College, Raipur where Dr.Utkarsh Tripathi (PW-13) conducted postmortem vide Ex.P-15 and found following injuries:- “1. Lacerated wound of size 3.5cm x 0.7cm x bone deep obliquely press with lower end on medial side on left forehead, 5cm from eyebrow with contused margins. 2. Lacerated wound of size 6cm x 2cm x bone deep present vertically just lateral to right eye with contused margins. 3. Lacerated wound of size 5cm x 1.5cm x tissue deep present obliquely with lower end posteriorly on helix of right ear along with skin behind it with contused margins. 4. Lacerated wound of size 4cm x 2cm x bone deep present obliquely with lower end laterally on right side of mandible with contused margins, with mandible with contused margins. 5. Abrasion wound of 4cm x 2cm present on left side of neck of dark red colour, with lacerated wound of 2cm x 1cm x neck tissue deep beneath it present obliquely with lower end medially, present 4 5cm from left angle of mandible. 6. Abrasion wound of 1cm x 1cm present on left side of forehead of dark red colour. 7. Multiple abrasion wound of 1cm x 1cm present on dorsum of right hand of dark red colour. 8. Multiple abrasion wound of 1cm x 1cm present on left wrist of dark red colour. 9. Lacerated wound of size 2cm x 1cm x bone deep present on right elbow.” The doctor has opined that cause of death was head injuries and its complications and manner of death was homicidal. Seized articles were sent to FSL for chemical examination and as per FSL report (Ex.P-27), human blood was found on Article ‘J” axe seized from the place of incident at the instance of the appellant. 3. After completing the investigation, a charge-sheet was filed against the accused under Section 302 IPC in the Judicial Magistrate First Class, Raipur, who in turn, committed the case to the Court of Sessions, Raipur, from where the Third Additional Sessions Judge, Raipur received the case on transfer for trial. 4. In order to bring home the offence, the prosecution has examined as many as 15 witnesses in its support. Statement of the accused/appellant under Section 313 Cr.P.C was recorded, wherein he has pleaded his innocence and false implication in the 5 matter. 5. The trial Court after appreciating oral and documentary evidence available on record, by its judgment dated 31.03.2022 convicted and sentenced the appellant as mentioned in paragraph one of this judgment. Hence, this appeal. 6. Learned counsel for the appellant would submit that the appellant has been falsely implicated in the present case. He would further submit that the conviction against the appellant is bad in law and it is not supported by the evidence of the prosecution beyond reasonable doubt. He would also submit that while passing the impugned judgment, the trial Court failed to appreciate the fact that there are material contradictions and omissions in the statements of the prosecution witnesses. Learned counsel contended that without there being any cogent evidence, the conviction of the appellant is bad in the eyes of law. According to the learned counsel, the prosecution has failed to establish a complete chain of circumstances against the appellant. He further contended that there is material illegality and perversity in the prosecution story purely based upon the false allegation that is an afterthought that too not supported by any of the eye-witnesses. As such, the criminal appeal deserves to be allowed and the impugned judgment deserves to be set aside. 7. On the other hand, learned Deputy Advocate General appearing for the respondent/State opposes the submissions made by the 6 counsel for the appellant and submits that the conviction of the appellant is well merited which does not call for any interference, therefore, this appeal deserves to be dismissed. 8. We have heard learned counsel for the parties, considered their rival submissions made herein-above and also went through the record with utmost circumspection. 9. The first question for consideration would be, whether the trial Court was justified in holding that death of deceased Kiran Todar was homicidal in nature ? 10. The trial Court relying upon the statements of Dr.Utkarsh Tripathi (PW-13), who has conducted postmortem on the body of deceased Kiran Todar vide Ex.P-15, has clearly come to the conclusion that death of deceased Kiran Todar was homicidal in nature. The said finding recorded by the trial Court is a finding of fact based on evidence available on record, which is neither perverse nor contrary to record. Even otherwise, it has not been seriously disputed by the learned counsel for the appellant. We hereby affirm the said finding. 11. The trial Court in para 33 of its judgment has observed that on the basis of the evidence, the prosecution has succeeded in proving, through circumstantial evidence, that accused Mayaram Gilahre and deceased Kiran Todar were together in the cowshed (Gouthan) performing watchman duties prior to the murder. After the incident, accused Mayaram went to the police station, and at 7 his instance, axe used in the crime was seized, which was found to contain human blood. There is no reasonable possibility that any third person committed the murder of Kiran Todar. If any person other than the accused had committed the murder, the accused would have known about this fact; however, the accused has remained silent in this regard. In such circumstances, no person other than the accused could have committed the murder of Kiran Todar. The chain of circumstantial evidence against the accused is thus complete as stated above, which is fully consistent with his guilt and wholly inconsistent with his innocence. Therefore, the Court has no doubt that the murder of Kiran Todar was committed by the accused. Consequently, it stands proved that the accused inflicted fatal injuries with a sharp- edged weapon (axe) and caused the death of Kiran Todar. Hence, accused Mayaram Gilahre is found guilty of the offence under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code and is hereby convicted. 12. Sandeep Kumar Verma (PW-1) also stated that sometime earlier, Kiran had told him that Mayaram did not perform his duty and would consume alcohol at night and sleep. Because of this, just before Dhanteras, some animals had escaped from the cowshed. Therefore, he went with the village Panch to check the cowshed at night and saw that Mayaram, in an intoxicated condition, was sleeping in the room, while Kiran was looking after the animals alone. He then told Mayaram that this is how he was doing 8 watchman duty, and that he should either stop drinking alcohol or leave the job. Thereafter, they removed Mayaram from the watchman duty, and Kiran continued to work alone in the cowshed. Two or three days later, Matharam came to him and said that he was a poor man and requested to be employed. They then told Mayaram that from now on, he would not be given food- related work and that he should properly perform duty in the cowshed. Thus, he was again assigned work in the cowshed. The next morning, around 3–4 A.M., the police came and informed him that a fight had occurred between Mayaram and Kiran in the cowshed, and that Mayaram had gone to the police station. On receiving this information, he went to the cowshed along with the Deputy Sarpanch Mohan Chakdhari, deceased’s brother Rupendra, and Mayaram’s son Manoj, where they saw that Kiran was lying dead in the watchman’s room. Thereafter, they went to the police station, and upon questioning Mayaram at the police station, Mayaram stated that he had killed Kiran with an axe. In paragraph 13 of his cross-examination, Sandeep Kumar Verma (PW-1) admitted that the cowshed is situated outside the village, and that it is enclosed with wire fencing. He denied the suggestion that anyone could easily enter the cowshed. 13. It is the case of no direct evidence, rather conviction is based on circumstantial evidence. 14. Upon cumulative analysis of the material available on record and evidence of the prosecution witnesses, at this stage, conviction 9 under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, which deals with punishment for murder, cannot be sustained solely on the basis of a chain of circumstances if that chain is not conclusively established. The prosecution must prove beyond reasonable doubt that all the links in the chain of circumstances consistently point to the guilt of the accused. If there is any break or weakness in the chain, or if the circumstances are open to multiple interpretations, it creates doubt. Since a charge as serious as murder demands the highest standard of proof, Courts are cautious and do not convict based on an incomplete or unproven chain of events. Therefore, without a firmly established chain of circumstances, a conviction under Section 302 IPC cannot be justifiably recorded. 15. In a case dependent on circumstantial evidence, the law is well settled that the chain of circumstances must be complete, conclusive, and exclude every hypothesis consistent with innocence (Sharad Birdhichand Sarda v. State of Maharashtra { AIR 1984 SC 1622} . Here, the chain is broken at multiple points: hostile testimony from key relatives, unreliable extra-judicial confession, doubtful recovery, and no conclusive forensic link. 16. The Supreme Court in the matter of Jagroop Singh v. State of Punjab {(2012) 11 SCC 768} has held thus in paragraphs 12, 13, 14 & 15 which is reproduced hereunder:- “12. In Sharad Birdhichand Sarda v. State of Maharashtra [(1984) 4 SCC 116] a three-Judge Bench 10 has laid down five golden principles which constitute the “panchsheel” in respect of a case based on circumstantial evidence. Referring to the decision in Shivaji Sahebrao Bobade v. State of Maharashtra [1973 2 SCC 793], it was opined that it is a primary principle that the accused “must be” and not merely “may be” guilty before a Court can convict and the mental distance between “may be” and “must be” is long and divides vague conjectures from sure conclusions. Thereafter, the Bench proceeded to lay down that the facts so established should be consistent only with the hypothesis of the guilt of the accused, that is to say, they should not be explainable on any other hypothesis except that the accused is guilty; that the circumstances should be of a conclusive nature and tendency; that they should exclude every possible hypothesis except the one to be proved; and that there must be a chain of evidence so complete as not to leave any reasonable ground for the conclusion consistent with the innocence of the accused and must show that in all human probability the act must have been done by the accused. 13. 13. In Padala Veera Reddy v. State of Andhra Pradesh and others [1989 Supp (2) SCC 706], this Court held that when a case rests upon circumstantial evidence,the following tests must be satisfied: “10.........(1) the circumstances from which an inference of guilt is sought to be drawn, must be cogently and firmly established; (2) those circumstances should be of a definite tendency unerringly pointing towards guilt of the 11 accused; (3) the circumstances, taken cumulatively, should form a chain so complete that there is no escape from the conclusion that within all human probability the crime was committed by the accused and none else; and (4) the circumstantial evidence in order to sustain conviction must be complete and incapable of explanation of any other hypothesis than that of the guilt of the accused and such evidence should not only be consistent with the guilt of the accused but should be inconsistent with his innocence.” A similar view has been reiterated in Ramreddy Rajesh Khanna Reddy and another v. State of A.P.[(2006) 10 SCC 172]. 14. In Balwinder Singh v. State of Punjab [1995 Supp(4) SCC 259], it has been laid down: “4. ........that the circumstances from which the conclusion of guilt is to be drawn should be fully proved and those circumstances must be conclusive in nature to connect the accused with the crime. All the links in the chain of events must be established beyond reasonable doubt and the established circumstances should be consistent only with the hypothesis of the guilt of the accused and totally inconsistent with his innocence. In a case based on circumstantial evidence, the Court has to be on its guard to avoid the danger of allowing suspicion to take the place of legal proof and has to be watchful to avoid the danger of being swayed by emotional considerations, howsoever strong they may be, to take the place of proof.” 12 15. In Harishchandra Ladaku Thange v. State of Maharashtra [(2007) 11 SCC 436], while dealing with the validity of inferences to be drawn from circumstantial evidence, it has been emphasised that where a case rests squarely on circumstantial evidence, the inference of guilt can be justified only when all the incriminating facts and circumstances are found to be incompatible with the innocence of the accused or the guilt of any other person and further the circumstances from which an inference as to the guilt of the accused is drawn have to be proved beyond reasonable doubt and have to be shown to be closely connected with the principal fact sought to be inferred from those circumstances.” 17. Further, the Supreme Court in the matter of Pradeep Kumar v. State of Chhattisgarh {(2023) 5 SCC 350} has observed thus in para 27:- “27. It is important to note that the cardinal principles in the administration of criminal justice in cases where heavy reliance is placed on circumstantial evidence, is that where two views are possible, one pointing to the guilt of the accused and the other towards his innocence, the one which is favourable to accused must be adopted.” 18. When the case is entirely based upon the circumstantial evidence, the chain of such circumstantial evidence in all probabilities 'must' indicate towards guilt of accused and circumstances 'must be' and not 'may be' lead towards guilt of accused. 19. In the present case, as per FSL report (Ex.P-27), human blood 13 was found on Article ‘J’ axe seized from the place of incident at the instance of the appellant. 20. At this stage, pertinent decision of the Supreme Court on this point in the matter of Balwan Singh v. Staet of Chhattisgarh and another {(2019) 7 SCC 781} may be noticed herein, in which the Supreme Court has summarized the law on this point after taking into the decision of the Supreme Court (Constitution Bench) in the matter of Raghav Prapanna Tripathi v. State of U.P. {AIR 1963 SC 74}. In Raghav Prapanna Tripathi (supra), the Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court has held that in case the prosecution needed to prove that the bloodstains found on the earth or the weapons were of a human origin and were of the same blood group as that of the accused. 21. The aforesaid decision of the Supreme Court i.e. Raghav Prapanna Tripathi (supra) was followed in Balwan Singh (supra) in which it was observed as under:- “23. From the aforementioned discussion, we can summarise that if the recovery of bloodstained articles is proved beyond reasonable doubt by the prosecution, and if the investigation was not found to be tainted, then it may be sufficient if the prosecution shows that the blood found on the articles is of human origin though, even though the blood group is not proved because of disintegration of blood. The court will have to come to the conclusion based on the facts and circumstances of each case, and there cannot be any fixed formula that the prosecution has to prove, or need not prove, that the blood groups match.” 14 22. Thereafter, the Supreme Court in Balwan Singh (supra) relying upon the fact that the prosecution has failed to prove that the blood was of human origin declined to rely upon the aspect of recovery of the weapons from the accused therein. It was observed as under:- “24. In the instant case, then, we could have placed some reliance on the recovery, had the prosecution at least proved that the blood was of human origin. As observed supra, while discussing the evidence of PWs 9 and 16, the prosecution has tried to concoct the case from stage to stage. Hence, in the absence of positive material indicating that the stained blood was of human origin and of the same blood group as that of the accused, it would be difficult for the Court to rely upon the aspect of recovery of the weapons and tabbal, and such recovery does not help the case of the prosecution.” 23. Considering the facts and circumstances of the case, as also the evidence on record, it would not be safe for this Court to hold that the appellant has murdered the deceased, thus, it cannot be said that the appellant murdered the deceased. 24. Applying the aforesaid principles to the facts of the present case, we are of the view that the prosecution has failed to prove the guilt of the appellant beyond all reasonable doubts and the case of the prosecution itself has negated the theory by their own evidence on record. Hence the conviction under Section 302 of the IPC deserves to be set aside. 15 25. For the foregoing reasons, the prosecution has not been able to prove that the accused had murdered the deceased. From the evidence of the prosecution witnesses, the same creates doubt, therefore, giving the benefit of doubt, the accused/appellant entitled to be acquitted of the alleged charge levelled against him for the aforesaid offence. 26. The accused is acquitted of the charge for which he was tried. The impugned judgment of conviction and order of sentence is set aside. The appellant is acquitted of the charge levelled against him. The appellant is in jail. He be released forthwith if not required in any other case, on furnishing a personal bond for a sum of Rs.25,000/- with one surety in the like sum to the satisfaction of the trial Court. The bail bond shall remain in operation for a period of six months as required under the provisions of Section 481 of the BNSS. The appellant shall appear before the higher Court as and when directed. Accordingly, the Criminal Appeal is allowed. 27. The trial Court record along with a copy of this judgment be sent back immediately to the trial Court concerned for compliance and necessary action. Sd/- Sd/- (Rajani Dubey) (Ramesh Sinha) Judge Chief Justice Bablu