Supreme Court Upholds Conviction Of Father For Pregnant Daughter's Murder Over Inter-Caste Marriage, Commutes Death Sentence

The Supreme Court today upheld the conviction of the father who committed the gruesome daylight murder of his pregnant daughter also leading to the death of the child in the womb.

While holding so, the bench comprising Justices BR Gavai, Aravind Kumar, and KV Viswanathan rejected the appellant's/father's contention that the non-examination of the independent witnesses by the prosecution would prove fatal to the prosecution's case. The Court said that non-examination of the independent witnesses by the prosecution would not affect its case when the eyewitness testimony was unquestionable and credible.

“The thrust of the arguments canvassed on behalf of the appellant is to the effect that non-examination of the owner of the tea stall located near the scene of crime; non-examination of the ward boy of Savkar hospital; non-examination of independent witnesses who had assembled near the scene of crime on hue and cry being raised by PW-2; was fatal to the prosecution case. Though at first blush, said arguments looks attractive, on deeper examination it has to be answered against the appellant as it is settled principle of law that non-examination of independent witnesses by itself would not give rise to adverse inference against the prosecution. It would only assume importance when the evidence of eyewitness raises a serious doubt about their presence at the time of actual occurrence.”, the court observed.

Reference was made to the case of Guru Dutt Pathak vs. State of Uttar Pradesh where it was held that when there is clinching evidence of eyewitnesses, mere non-examination of some of the witnesses/independent witnesses and in the absence of examination of any independent witnesses would not be fatal to the case of the prosecution.

“After considering the evidence of PW1, PW2 and PW3 it is clear that appellant with the motive of killing his daughter had visited her matrimonial home along with PW2 and has taken her in an auto rickshaw on the pretext of visiting his mother and had strangulated her. The appellant is said to have asked PW2 to stop the auto near Savkar hospital and asked him to search for the watchman. By the time PW2 was back, the appellant was strangulating Pramila by means of a rope or string. The chain of events establish the guilt of the appellant beyond reasonable doubt and there are no other circumstances to disbelieve the theory of the prosecution.”, the court observed.

Background

This was the case where the appellant/accused was unhappy with his daughter's (deceased) decision to marry a man lower than his caste. Against the appellant's wishes, the deceased got married. The appellant was also furious that his image was tarnished by his daughter's act and that he was not accepted by the people of his caste.

One fine day, the appellant approached his pregnant daughter's matrimonial home with the reason to take her on the false pretext that her mother (appellant's wife) was in hospital and wanted to see the deceased. Meanwhile, when PW 2 (traveling along with the appellant and deceased) went to find the watchman, the appellant strangulated the deceased to death.

The Trial Court convicted the appellant under Section 302 IPC and sentenced him to the death penalty, which was confirmed by the High Court. Following this, the appeal was preferred before the Supreme Court.

Court Set-Aside Capital Punishment

While upholding the conviction, the Supreme Court discussed whether the appellant's case falls within the category of 'rarest of rare cases' to approve the sentence of capital punishment.

After perusing the Prison Conduct Report, Probation Officer's Report of the accused, Psychological Evaluation Report of the Accused, and Mitigation Investigation Report, the Court observed that the present case doesn't fall within the category of rarest of rare case.

“We have scrutinized the aforesaid reports submitted to this court. We find that the present case would not fall in the category of “rarest of rare cases” wherein it can be held that imposition of death penalty is the only alternative. We are of the considered opinion that the present case would fall in the category of middle path as held by this court in various judgments of this court.”

“In the instant case, it is to be noted that appellant hails from a poor nomadic community in Maharashtra. He had an alcoholic father and suffered parental neglect and poverty. He dropped out of school when he was 10 years old and was forced to start working to support his family, doing odd jobs. All efforts put by the appellant to bring his family out of poverty did not yield desired results. Neither the appellant nor any of his family members have any criminal antecedent. It cannot be presumed that appellant is a hardened criminal who cannot be reformed. Hence, it cannot be said that there is no possibility of reformation, even though the appellant has committed a gruesome crime.”, the court added.

“The doctrine of “rarest of rare” requires that death sentence should not be imposed only by taking into consideration the grave nature of crime but only if there is no possibility of reformation by a criminal. Being conscious of the fact that sentence of life imprisonment is subject to remission, which would not be appropriate in view of the gruesome crime committed by the appellant, the course of middle path requires to be adopted in the instant case. In that view of the matter, we find that the death penalty needs to be converted to a fixed sentence during which period the appellant would not be entitled to apply for remission.”

In view of the above, the court overturned capital punishment to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment without remission.

Appearances:

Dr. Aditya Sondhi, Sr. Adv. for the appellant

Mr. Siddharth Dharmadhikari, Adv. for the respondent

Case Title: EKNATH KISAN KUMBHARKAR VERSUS STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

Citation : 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 804

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