Gudda @ Dwarikendra V/s State of Madhya Pradesh

Information Type: Judicial Information
Court: Supreme Court
Date of Judgment(s): 2013-09-30
Case No: 1566-1567 of 2013
Case Type: Appeal (Criminal)
Judge Name: H.L. Dattu, Sudhansu Jyoti Mukhopadhaya & M.Y. Eqbal
Subject: Criminal Law-Capital Punishment
Statutes / Acts: Indian Penal Code 1860 (IPC), Code of Criminal Procedure 1973
Bench Strength: Full Bench
Advocate: Vijay Kumar, Gopi Chand and Preeti Bhardwaj et. al (P) & Vibha Datta Makhija, Sr. Adv., Vanshja Shukla and Mishra Saurab (R)
State of Appellant(s): Punjab
History of Case No: Order dated 16.01.2012 of the High Court of Madhya Pradesh, Principal Seat at Jabalpur in Criminal Reference No. 3 of 2010 and Criminal Appeal No. 2246 of 2010
Equal Citation Details :

2014(1)ACR503, 2013X AD (S.C.) 477, 2014(1)AJR415, 2014 (84) ALLCC 283, ILR[2013]MP2309, 2014(1)PLJR482, 2013(4)RCR(Criminal)615, 2013(12)SCALE290, 2014 (1) SCJ 390

Case Note / Description :

The present appeal - Held, testimony of the two eye-witnesses was natural, convincing and well corroborated by the evidence of other relevant witnesses and the medical evidence - There was nothing on record to suggest any dispute between the two eye-witnesses and the Appellant or hint towards bitterness in their relationships so as to suggest their false testimony against him - Additionally, no such close alliance of the witnesses with the deceased persons has surfaced so as to prove their bias towards the Appellant - Thus, the evidence of the two eye-witnesses was credible and trustworthy - There was though no evidence to establish the genesis of the incident as it occurred within the four walls of the Appellants house - When the Appellant suspected the deceased persons illicit relationship with A2, the deceased would not have dared to enter the house of Appellant, with his wife and child and attempted to rape A2 and on her resistance threatened to assault her with the knife - Statement of Appellant that when A2 was shouting for help, the wife of the deceased and the child continued to sit outside on the terrace while the Appellant intervened to protect A2 and the deceased assaulted the Appellant and on the intervention in the scuffle the wife and the child received the fatal injuries - Plea of right to private defence and nonorchestrated nature of the offence stand vitiated by the evidence of a witness who testified that A2, immediately after the fateful incident narrated the version of the genesis of the incident absolutely contrary to the version stated by the Appellant - Prosecution case stood well supported and established by the evidence of witnesses coupled with the evidence of Doctors, the post-mortem report and medical evidence and does not leave any room for doubt as to the guilt of the Appellant - Courts below held to be right in convicting the Appellant for the murder of the three persons under Section 302 of the IPC and the conviction accordingly upheld Criminal - Award of death penalty - Appeal against sentencing - Held, as well settled awarding of life sentence is the rule, death is an exception - Number of deaths or the factum of whole family being wiped off cannot be the sole criteria for determining whether the case falls into the category of rarest of rare - Further, brutality also cannot be the only criterion for determining whether a case falls under the rarest of rare categories - In the instant case, the genesis of crime and the manner of occurrence inside the house of the Appellant remained clouded while the guilt was clearly established with the aid of available evidence - Factum of the crime being pre-ordained and the motive of the Appellant in brutally assaulting the deceased with a knife after having invited him at his house for lunch stems from his suspicion on his wifes fidelity and his abhorrence for her relationship with the deceased .

 
 
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