IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA Criminal Appeal No. 595 of 1996 Date of Decision : July 27, 2010 State of Himachal Pradesh Appellant Versus Hoshiar Singh Respondent Coram: The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Deepak Gupta, Judge The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Sanjay Karol, Judge. Whether approved for reporting?1 No. For the appellant : Mr. Rajesh Mandhotra, Deputy Advocate General for the appellant. For the respondent : Mr. Vinay Thakur, Advocate, for the respondent. Deepak Gupta, J. (Oral) This appeal by the State is directed against the judgment dated 13.12.1994 passed by the learned Sessions Judge, Bilaspur, H.P. in Sessions Trial No. 17 of 1992 whereby he acquitted the accused of having committed an offence punishable under Section 376 read with Section 306 of the Indian Penal Code. 2. The prosecution case in brief is that the prosecutrix was a young girl aged about 16 years. On 8.11.1991 she was suddenly Whether reports of Local Papers may be allowed to see the judgment? Yes. 2 taken ill and was taken to Civil Hospital, Berthin. It was suspected that she had consumed poison and she was referred to District Hospital, Bilaspur. Unfortunately, this young girl expired on the way to the hospital. Her parents who were illiterate and very poor brought the dead body back to their home and cremated it in the evening. On the next day Smt. Geeta Devi (PW-2), mother of the prosecutrix was checking her bedding and found one letter under the pillow on the bed of the prosecutrix. She being illiterate could not read the letter and handed it over to her husband Sh. Nikku Ram (PW-1), father of the prosecutrix who was also illiterate. This letter was shown to Sh. Gorakh Singh (PW-3) and Sh. Piar Singh (PW-5) and was read over by the villagers. In this letter, purportedly written by the prosecutrix it was written that the accused had threatened her, forcibly committed rape with her and since she had been dishonoured she was left with no option but to commit suicide in order to save the honour of her family. The said letter was given to the police and report Ext. PA was lodged by PW-1. On the basis of this report F.I.R. was registered and investigation conducted. It is alleged that before the prosecutrix was taken to hospital she had vomited and the contents of the vomit were taken into possession by the police and sent for chemical analysis. 3. During investigation Sh. Nikku Ram, father of the prosecutrix produced an exercise book allegedly containing the hand writing of the prosecutrix and the said exercise book has been exhibited in 3 Court as Ext. P-3. On the basis of this and other material collected during investigation the accused was charged with having committed the offences aforesaid. 4. The learned trial Court acquitted the accused mainly on the ground that the prosecution has miserably failed to prove that the exercise book was in the hand writing of the prosecutrix. No doubt the hand writing expert to whom this exercise book as well as the suicide note had been sent had opined that the hand writing of both the exercise book and the suicide note was of the same person but there was no evidence led to show in whose handwriting the exercise book was written. 5. This is one of those cases where the prosecution has miserably failed to investigate and conduct the case in a proper fashion. Admittedly the exercise book in question related to a school. There were counter signatures of the teacher of the school on various pages. The best person to have identified the hand writing was the school teacher. Therefore, on 15.6.2010 we had passed a detailed order directing the Superintendent of Police to find out the school teacher whose signatures appear on various pages of the note book. This report has been filed and it has been submitted that the school teacher in question was Sh. Prem Lal Sharma. Unfortunately he also expired a long time back. As such there is no body to identify the hand writing since the parents of the prosecutrix were admittedly illiterate and could not read anything and candidly 4 stated in Court that they could not say in whose hand writing the exercise book and suicide note was written. 6. In view of the above discussions there is no merit in the appeal which is accordingly dismissed. The accused if not on bail be released forthwith. The Registry is directed to send intimation in this behalf to the Open Air Jail, Bilaspur. Bail bonds, if any, furnished by the accused are ordered to be discharged. (Deepak Gupta), Judge. (Sanjay Karol), Judge. July 27, 2010 (PK)