Brief Facts
- The FIR was lodged by the deceased’s brother, who found the victim lying dead at his home and took him to the hospital, where he was declared dead. Suspicion fell on the victim’s son due to a property dispute. During interrogation, the son revealed name of two associates, Kamal Kishore and Manoj, appellants herein. Kamal Kishore led to the recovery of a rusted iron rod, and Manoj revealed a sweater used in the strangulation. All three were convicted under Section 302 read with Section 34 IPC. Their appeal to the High Court was also dismissed, leading to the present appeal.
Issues
- Whether the Test Identification Parade (TIP) carried out during the trial be reliable when the accused persons were already shown to the witnesses in the Police Station?
- Whether the CDR of accused can be relied to connect him with the offence when the prosecution has also placed on record the mobile tower location of accused and claims that the accused was present in the house of deceased at the time of incident?
- Whether the accused can be convicted on the basis of strong suspicion in a case based on circumstantial evidence?
Held
- The Supreme Court ordered for the acquittal of the accused.
- We fail to appreciate the correctness of this finding. If the accused are already shown to the witnesses in the Police Station, then the sanctity of TIP before the court is doubtful.
- Firstly, it is to be noted that one of the mobile numbers #### alleged to have been used by accused Manoj is not in the name of Manoj but one Ashok Kumar, son of Shri Krishan Kumar, resident of Subhash Nagar, Kanpur. No evidence is placed on record to show as to how the said SIM came to be in possession of the accused Manoj. Apart from that, if at the time of the incident both of them were at the same place and according to the prosecution inside the house of the deceased Hoshiyar Singh, and they were talking to each other on telephone, this itself creates a doubt on the prosecution version.
- It can thus be seen that this Court has held that the circumstances from which the conclusion of guilt is to be drawn should be fully established. It has been held that the circumstances concerned “must or should” and not “may be” established. It has been held that there is not only a grammatical but a legal distinction between “may be proved” and “must be or should be proved”. It has been held 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. It has been held that the circumstances should be of a conclusive nature and tendency and they should exclude every possible hypothesis except the one sought to be proved, and that there must be a chain of evidence so complete so 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.
- It is a settled principle of law that however strong a suspicion may be, it cannot take place of a proof beyond reasonable doubt.
Relevant Para No.
- 13, 15, 18, 19