"Extra-Judicial Confession Not Corroborated": Allahabad High Court Upholds Acquittal Of Murder-Robbery Accused

The Allahabad High Court recently upheld the acquittal of a Murder-Robbery accused as it noted that the alleged extrajudicial confession made by all the accused persons was highly unnatural and the same was not corroborated by any other evidence.

Essentially, the Bench of Justice Vivek Kumar Birla and Justice Subhash Vidyarthi was hearing an appeal filed by the informant of the case (US/ 372 CrPC) challenging the judgment and order of September 2021 passed by Additional Session Judge, Bijnor, acquitting the accused persons in a Murder-Robbery case.

The case against the Accused

As per the prosecution case, on December 26, 2009, the Informant-Appellant gave a report to the police stating that his 21 years old son Deepak Verma (deceased) was killed by unidentified miscreants when he was going on his motorcycle to his home after closing the jewelry shop.

It was also alleged that he was carrying some articles of jewelry in a steel box with him, which was given to him by the informant (father of the deceased). Lastly, it was alleged that the Chief Veterinary Officer, Bijnor, and two contractors had got his son killed pursuant to a conspiracy.

After the investigation, a charge sheet under section 394 302 read with section 35 C was filed against the 4 accused respondents. After holding a trial in the matter, the Court recorded a finding that the prosecution could not prove the charges against the accused respondents beyond reasonable doubt and, accordingly, they all were acquitted.

The Informant Appellant filed the instant appeal against the aforesaid judgment and order. No one appeared for the Appellant when the matter was listed and therefore, the court proceeded to peruse the record with the assistance of the A.G.A. and the judgment was reserved.

Court's observations 

At the outset, appreciating the evidence, the Court came to the conclusion that the informant's allegations that the accused-respondents 2 to 5 used to keep on standing near the place of the incident since four days before the date of the incident same, was false.

Further, the Court noted that as per the inquest report, ₹24,411/- cash was recovered from the deceased's pocket, 2 gold rings were recovered from his hand and some documents in his pocket were recovered from his pocket and the motorcycle and its key was also recovered lying near the place of occurrence.\

In view of this, the Court observed that if the deceased been killed with the intention of committing robbery, the miscreants would have taken away the cash, gold rings, and motorcycle, etc.

Significantly, the Court took into account the testimony of PW - 2 Ram Kishan Verma, who had stated that all the accused persons had come to his home around 1.5 years after the incident, and said that they killed the deceased by mistake; that the police was harassing them and that they requested PW - 2 to help in settling the matter.

Regarding this alleged extra-judicial confession, the Court was of the opinion that the same was not natural and was uncorroborated as the Court essentially averred thus:

"...In his cross-examination PW-2 showed his ignorance about the date and even the month in which the accused persons had gone to his home and did not state as to when did he give information of the visit of the accused persons to his home to the Informant...The name of the accused persons had been included about a year after the incident on the basis of an alleged extrajudicial confession made by all the accused persons by going to PW-2 on 25-04-2011 and confessing the incident allegedly occurred on 26-12-2009, which is highly unnatural and which was not corroborated by any other evidence. Therefore, we are of the view that the said extra-judicial confession does not appear to be reliable so as to prove the guilt of the accused / respondents beyond a reasonable doubt."

With this, noting that the prosecution could not establish the guilt of the accused respondent number 2 to 5 and the findings of the Court below in this regard do not suffer from any infirmity and the same are not at all perverse, the Court held that the appeal lacked merits and the same was, accordingly, dismissed at the stage of admission itself.

Case title - Raj Kumar Verma v. State of U.P. and Others
Case citation:2022 LiveLaw (AB) 114

Click here To Read/Download Order