HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD CRIMINAL APPEAL No. - 773 of 1983 Court No. - 93 HON'BLE MRS. VANI RANJAN AGRAWAL, J. 1. Heard Sri Satyendra Prakash Srivastava, learned counsel for the appellant and Sri Rahul Asthana, learned A.G.A. for the State respondent. 2. Upon a written report, First Information Report (F.I.R.) was registered against five accused persons namely Sunna Lal, Ram Charan, Nand Kishore, Sita Ram and Ghanshyam and after due investigation charge sheet was submitted under Sections 147, 307/149 and 323/149 I.P.C., Police Station Kotwali, District Jhansi and vide judgement and order dated 31.3.1983 passed by learned Special & Additional Sessions Judge, Jhansi in Sessions Trial No.217 of 1981 (State vs. Sunna Lal and others), under Sections 307 read with Section 149, 147 I.P.C., whereby convicting and sentencing the appellants under Section 307 read with Section 149 I.P.C. to undergo five years rigorous imprisonment; under Sections 147 I.P.C. to undergo six months imprisonment and all the sentences passed against each accused will run concurrently. 3. Being aggrieved the accused-appellants preferred this criminal appeal against their conviction and sentence. 4. This appeal stands already abated qua the appellant no.2 namely Ram Charan and appellant no.4 Sita Ram vide order dated 16.9.2025 passed by Versus Counsel for Appellant(s) : A.C. Chaturvedi, I.M.Kushwaha, N.K. Mishra, R.K. Kaushik, Satyendra Prakash Srivastava, Vijay Kumar Kushwaha Counsel for Respondent(s) : A.G.A, Ankita Singh, Awadhesh Kumar Shukla, Brijesh Sahai, Indra Kumar Chaturvedi(Senior Adv.) Sunna Lal And Others .....Appellant(s) State of U.P. .....Respondent(s) coordinate Bench of this Court. 5. Lower Court Record in this case was not received by this Court. In compliance of order dated 9.1.2020 passed by this Court a report has been submitted by the Incharge Officer of the record room, District Court, Jhansi wherein it has been stated that Nathi 'ka' of the trial Court record has been destroyed and an inquiry has been instituted in this regard. Further a report has been submitted by the office on 5.10.2021 submitting that a letter dated 15.9.2020 (flag 'B') of the learned District Judge, Jhansi has been received wherein it has been stated that reconstruction of trial Court record of S.T. No.217 of 1981 is not possible. Thus I find that Lower Court Record is not traceable and its reconstruction is not possible. 6. Now, I consider as to whether retrial would be appropriate or not. It may be noted here that the incident is dated 28.6.1980. The trial is of the year 1981. The judgment of the Court below is dated 31.3.1983 and this appeal is pending before this Court since 1983. After a gap of almost 45 years from the date of incident, in absence of the record no fruitful purpose would be served for directing retrial. Firstly the relevant papers which need to be proved and exhibited are not available and even if some of the witnesses are available, after four decades, no purposes would be served. Further after a gap of 45 years the memory of the witnesses to depose accurate account of the incident would be doubtful. I am accordingly of the view that the retrial would be an exercise in futility. 7. Considering the law on the point that where Lower Court Record is not traceable, reconstruction is not possible and even retrial is not possible as laid down by the Apex Court in the case of State of U.P. vs. Abhay Raj Singh, reported in 2004 (4) SCC 6 and Division Bench in the case of Brahmanand Shukla vs. State of U.P. [LAWS (AlLL)-2010-4-10, I am left with no option but to decide this appeal as per the settled law. 8. The Criminal Appeal No.773 of 1983 is accordingly allowed. The judgment and order of the Trial Court dated 31.3.1983 is set aside and the CRLA No. 773 of 1983 2 above named accused are acquitted of the charges levelled against them. The above named accused-appellants are on bail. Their bail bonds and sureties are cancelled. The sureties are discharged from their liabilities. In case the above named accused-appellants Sunna Lal, Nand Kishore and Ghanshyam are not wanted in any other case, they need not to surrender. January 28, 2026 Dev CRLA No. 773 of 1983 3 (Mrs. Vani Ranjan Agrawal,J.) Digitally signed by :- DEV PRAKASH High Court of Judicature at Allahabad