Allahabad High Court
State Of U.P. vs Ganga Devi W/O Jeesukhram on 25 June, 2025
Author: Jayant Banerji
Bench: Jayant Banerji
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD Neutral Citation No. - 2025:AHC:99551-DB Court No. - 64 Case :- GOVERNMENT APPEAL DEFECTIVE No. - 285 of 2025 Appellant :- State of U.P. Respondent :- Ganga Devi W/O Jeesukhram Counsel for Appellant :- Patanjali Mishra Hon'ble Jayant Banerji,J.
Hon’ble Madan Pal Singh,J.
(Per Hon’ble Madan Pal Singh, J.)
Order on Delay Condonation Application.
1. Delay of 40 days as reported by the Stamp Reporter is to be condoned in view of application for delay condonation along with an affidavit in support thereof which have been filed.
2. The delay is condoned and the delay condonation application is allowed.
3. Office is directed to allot regular number to this appeal.
Order on Criminal Misc. (Leave to Appeal) Application No. … of 2025
4. Heard learned AGA for the State-appellant and perused the material on record.
5. The above noted leave to appeal has been filed praying for grant of leave to the appellant against the judgment and order dated 05.02.2025 passed by Additional District & Sessions/ Special Judge Corruption (U.P.S.E.B.), Court No. 06, Bareilly in Sessions Trial No. 830/2017 (State Vs. Ganga Devi).
6. By the aforesaid judgment and order, the accused-respondent had been acquitted of all the charges under Sections 302 IPC, which was registered as Case Crime No. 423 of 2017 at Police Station- Sheesgarh, District- Bareilly.
7. The prosecution story in brief is that the Vipin (deceased) had a grocery shop opposite to the petrol pump in Village- Girdharpur, Police Station – Sheesgarh. On 21.12.2017, money was stolen from the grocery shop of one Ramavtar of the same village and on the basis of mere suspicion he held Vipin (deceased) and beaten him. Ramavtar also taken away goods worth about Rs. 4 Lakhs from grocery shop of Vipin with the help of his servant. While searching, the lost money was recovered from the possession of Ajay (son of Ramavtar). On 22.12.2017 at about 7:00 a.m. in morning when Vipin was passing in front of the grocery shop of Ramavtar, he called the deceased and took him to his house. Since that time, the deceased has not returned home. In search of deceased his mother inquired near by places and relatives but the deceased could not traced out. On 23.12.2017 at about 8:00 a.m. one of the villager informed her about the dead body of deceased (Vipin) which was lying in the orchard. After getting the information the mother and other family members of the deceased went to the spot where dead body of her son was laying. It is further alleged that Ramavtar had committed the murder of her son.
8. After lodging the FIR in the present case, the Investigating Officer started investigation and after making detailed investigation, completed all formalities and collecting credible evidence submitted charge sheet against the accused in the court below to face trial.
9. The accused denied the charges and sought the trial.
10. The prosecution in order to prove its case has examined PW-1 Rajendra Prasad (first informant), PW-2 Smt. Kusum (wife of the informant), PW-3 Rameshwar, PW-4 Thakurdas, PW- 5 , Arvind Kumar, PW-6 Vedram, PW-7 Ajay Maurya, PW-8 Devidas, PW-9 Ramavtar, PW-10 Umashankar , PW-11, Bandhuram, PW-12 Lekhraj, P.W13 Sanuj Kumar. (S.I.), P.W. 14 Jugal Kishore (Retd.) PW-15- Dr. Satish Kumar.
11. Learned counsel for the appellant has submitted that trial court has misread the evidence on record and wrongly acquitted the respondents.
12. The appellate Court is usually reluctant to interfere with a judgment acquitting an accused on the principle that the presumption of innocence in favour of the accused is reinforced by such a judgment. The above principle has been consistently followed by the Constitutional Court while deciding appeals against acquittal by way of Article 136 of the Constitution or appeals filed under Section 378 and 386 (a) Cr.P.C. in State of M.P. Vs. Sharad Goswami,(2021) 17 SCC 783; State of Rajasthan Vs. Shera Ram, (2012) 1 SCC 602, Shivaji Sahabrao Bobade Vs. State of Maharastra, (1973) 2 SCC 793.
13. The Supreme Court in the case of Ramesh Babulal Doshi Vs. State of Gujarat, (1996) 9 SCC 225 has observed that the High Court must examine the reasons given by the trial Court for recording their acquittal before disturbing the same by re-appraising the evidence recorded by the trial court. For clarity, para 7 is extracted herein below:
“Before proceeding further it will be pertinent to mention that the entire approach of the High Court in dealing with the appeal was patently wrong for it did not at all address itself to the question as to whether the reasons which weighed with the trial Court for recording the order of acquittal were proper or not. Instead thereof the High Court made an independent reappraisal of the entire evidence to arrive at the above quoted conclusions. This Court has repeatedly laid down that the mere fact that a view other than the one taken by the trial Court can be legitimately arrived at by the appellate Court on reappraisal of the evidence cannot constitute a valid and sufficient ground to interfere with an order of acquittal unless it comes to the conclusion that the entire approach of the trial Court in dealing with the evidence was patently illegal or the conclusions arrived at by it were wholly untenable. While sitting in judgment over an acquittal the appellant Court is first required to seek an answer to the question whether the findings of the trial Court are palpably wrong, manifestly erroneous or demonstrably unsustainable. If the appellant Court answers the above question in the negative the order of acquittal is not to be disturbed. Conversely, if the appellant Court holds, for reasons to be recorded, that the order of acquittal cannot at all be sustained in view of any of the above infirmities it can then – and then only – reappraise the evidence to arrive at its own conclusions. In keeping with the above principles we have therefore to first ascertain whether the findings of the trial Court are sustainable or not.”
14. The Supreme Court in the case of Sadhu Saran Singh Vs. State of U.P., (2016) 4 SCC 357 has observed that an appeal against acquittal has always been on an altogether different pedestal from an appeal against conviction. In an appeal against acquittal, where the presumption of innocence in favour of the accused is reinforced, the appellate court would interfere with the order of acquittal only when there is perversity.
15. The Supreme Court in the case Basheera Begam Vs. Mohd. Ibrahim, (2020) 11 SCC 174 has held that the burden of proving an accused guilty beyond all reasonable doubt lies on the prosecution. If, upon analysis of evidence, two views are possible, one which points to the guilt of the accused and the other which is inconsistent with the guilt of the accused, the latter must be preferred. Reversal of a judgment and other of conviction and acquittal of the accused should not ordinarily be interfered with unless such reversal/acquittal is vitiated by perversity. In other words, the court might reverse an order of acquittal if the court finds that no person properly instructed in law could have, upon analysis of the evidence on record, found the accused to be “not guilty”. When circumstantial evidence points to the guilt of the accused, it is necessary to prove a motive for the crime. However, motive need not be proved where there is direct evidence. In this case, there is no direct evidence of the crime.
16. The Supreme Court in the case of Kali Ram Vs. State of H.P., (1973) 2 SCC 808 has observed as under:
“25. Another golden thread which runs through the web of the administration of justice in criminal cases is that if two views are possible on the evidence adduced in the case, one pointing to the guilt of the accused and other to his innocence, the view which is favourable to the accused should be adopted. This principle has a special relevance in cases wherein the guilt of the accused is sought is to established by circumstantial evidence.”
17. The Supreme Court again examined in State of Odisha v. Banabihari Mohapatra & Ors, (2021) 15 SCC 268 the effect of the probability of two views in cases of appeal against acquittal and held that if two views are possible on the evidence adduced in the case, one pointing to the guilt of the accused, and the other to his innocence, the view which is favourable to the accused should be adopted.
18. The Supreme Court in Sujit Biswas v. State of Assam, (2013) 12 SCC 406 has reiterated the position that suspicion, however strong, cannot replace proof. An accused is presumed to be innocent unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
19. In the background of the law discussed herein above, we will examine the trial court’s findings and evidence adduced during the trial by the witnesses to test the legality and validity of the impugned order.
20. We have heard learned counsel for the appellant and perused the material on record. It is evident that this case is based on purely circumstantial evidence. In this regard, law laid down by the Hon’ble Apex Court in Sharad Birdhichand Sarda vs. State of Maharashtra reported in (1984) 4 SCC 116, the Apex Court evolved five tests to be established by the prosecution in order to prove the guilt of accused based on circumstantial evidence. Five golden principles have been enumerated which are reproduced hereinafter:
“(1)Certainly, 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.”
(2) 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,
(3) the circumstances should be of a conclusive nature and tendency.
(4) they should exclude every possible hypothesis except the one to be proved, and
(5) 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.
21. In the light of the above case law and on a perusal of material available on record it reflects that there are two witnesses namely Ramesh and Vedram who have been examined by the prosecution as P.W.-3 and P.W. -6 respectively. Both have stated before the court that on the intervening night of 22/23.12.2017, when they woke up for urination, they saw that the accused along with her other son, Maan Singh, carrying the deceased-Vipin on shoulder, on asking about Vipin both the accused stated that they are carrying Vipin to the doctor for his treatment. On the very next day, the dead body of Vipin was found in the orchard. It is very surprising that even though both the witnesses are resident of the same village but they kept mum for about ten months from the date of incident and did not disclose this fact to any of the villagers. The learned trial judge also mentioned in paragraph no. 96 of the judgment that the statement of above two witnesses were recorded by the Investigating Officer after ten months of the incident. If they had seen something strange in the intervening night of 23.12.2017 and very next day, dead body of the Vipin was found in the orchard, it was very natural for these witnesses to disclose the facts to the co-villagers and this information would have been spread in the entire village and it would also have come to the knowledge of the Investigating Officer. In such circumstances, Investigating Officer could have recorded the statements of these witnesses at the very early stage. Thus, recording of their statements after delay of about ten months does not seem to be reliable regarding the incident, which had taken place on 22.12.2017.
22. In the case of circumstantial evidence, motive also plays a very important role. In this case, motive which has been assigned to the accused Ganga Devi is that there was some money which had to be paid to one Ramavtar, and to avoid the same, she had committed the murder of her own son and thereafter registered a false case against Ramavtar to escape from the same.
23. We are not convinced with the motive which has been assigned to the present accused, no person of prudent mind would believe that a mother would committed the murder of her own son just to avoid the payment of some debt. Thus, the motive assigned to the accused respondents does not inspire any confidence.
24. It is evident from the record that there is no eye witness, who had seen the accused committing crime and the witnesses which are said to be last seen were not found reliable during trial and nothing incriminating has been recovered from her possession. So far as the testimony of other witnesses are concerned, they have stated in their cross-examination that they had not seen the incident rather deposed before the court that they have heard about the murder of the deceased (Vipin) on the basis rumour spread in the village. Thus the testimony of these witnesses are hearsay evidence which have no evidentiary value in the eye law.
25. So far as the testimony of P.W.-1 Rajendra Prasad is concerned, he has stated in his cross-examination that his statement under Section 164 Cr.P.C. was got recorded under the pressure of police personnel and after feeling free from the pressure of the police, he submitted an application under Section 156 (3) Cr. P.C. against the Investigating Officer of the case which was treated as complaint case. Thus, the accused cannot be convicted on the basis of such a statement which was resiled later on before the Court. The trial court after considering the statement of the witnesses and the material available on record finds that the accused- appellant has not committed the offence as alleged, therefore, he recorded the finding of acquittal.
26. Considering the facts, case law relied upon by the learned AGA, statement of witnesses and after scrutinizing the judgment of the trial court, we are of the considered opinion that the judgment of acquittal recorded by the trial court does not call for any interference and deserves to be affirmed.
27. Learned AGA has argued well but from the perusal of the entire evidence available on record, nowhere do we find that the chain of circumstances, as has been pointed out by the learned State counsel, is complete, therefore, the finding of acquittal as has been recorded by the trial deserves to be affirmed. Hence, the submissions advanced by learned AGA has no force.
28. Accordingly, the application for leave to appeal is rejected.
Order on Government Appeal
29. Since leave to appeal application is rejected, therefore, the above noted government appeal is, hereby, dismissed.
30. Let the record of the trial court be returned and this judgement to be notified to the trial court, within two weeks.
Order Date :- 25.6.2025/Akbar
(Madan Pal Singh,J.) (Jayant Banerji,J.)