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Supreme Court Refuses To Interfere With Acquittal Of Union Minister Ajay Mishra 'Teni' In 23-Year-Old Murder Case
Gyanvi Khanna
8 Jan 2024 4:31 PM IST
The Supreme Court, today (on January 08), refused to interfere with the Allahabad High Court's order upholding the acquittal of Union Minister of State for Home, Ajay Mishra Teni, in the murder case of Prabhat Gupta. Gupta, a rising student leader, was killed in broad daylight in Lakhimpur Khiri district in the year 2000. In the instant case, four people, including Union Minister Teni,...
The Supreme Court, today (on January 08), refused to interfere with the Allahabad High Court's order upholding the acquittal of Union Minister of State for Home, Ajay Mishra Teni, in the murder case of Prabhat Gupta. Gupta, a rising student leader, was killed in broad daylight in Lakhimpur Khiri district in the year 2000.
In the instant case, four people, including Union Minister Teni, were named as accused. In 2004, Teni was acquitted by the lower Court. Against the lower court's order, a revision plea was filed by the complainant/revisionist (Santosh Gupta/father of deceased Prabhat Gupta) before the High Court.
The revision was admitted in February 2005 and was connected with the Criminal Appeal filed by the state government against the acquittal order. The High Court dismissed the revision plea and the State's appeal. In this background, the instant appeal was filed by the legal heir of the complainant.
The matter was placed before the Bench of Justices Bela M. Trivedi and Pankaj Mithal. The Top Court said that it is not inclined to interfere with the concurrent findings of the High Court and the Trial Court.
Brief Background
The allegations against Teni are that he had a dispute with the deceased regarding the Panchayat elections. Hence, the deceased was shot dead by Teni and co-accused Subhash alias Mama. As per the state's case, the trial court ignored the eyewitness testimony. Per contra, Teni had argued that the trial court had not found the alleged eyewitness testimony to be reliable. Hence, the trial court was justified in acquitting him of the offence.
The High Court's Bench of Justices Attau Rahman Masoodi and Om Prakash Shukla found the Trial Court's order “to be a plausible and sustainable view, especially when the Trial Court had the advantage of seeing and assessing the demeanour of witnesses.”
It concluded that there was no perversity in the order of acquittal passed by the Trial Court .
“The evidence recorded in the present case has been appreciated in its correct perspective and the Trial court has at no point of time missed the woods of the tree. Thus, we do not find any perversity in the order of acquittal passed by the Trial Court and in any case, the law presumes double presumption in favour of the accused after a due adjudication by the trial Court.”
Case Title: RAJEEV GUPTA vs. AJAY MISHRA ALIAS TANI., Diary No.- 33673 - 2023
