IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH SHIMLA Cr. Appeal No.445 of 2008 Decided on: July 7, 2009. Tajinder Singh …Appellant Versus State of H.P. …Respondent Coram The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Surjit Singh, Judge. Whether approved for reporting?1 For the Appellant : Mr. Vinod Gupta, Advocate. For the Respondents : Mr. Ramesh Thakur, Assistant Advocate General. Surjit Singh, Judge (oral) Heard and gone through the record. 2. Appellant has assailed the judgment dated 8.5.2008 of learned Sessions Court, whereby he has been convicted of an offence, under Section 376 IPC and sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for seven years and to pay a fine of Rs.10,000/-; in default of payment of fine to undergo rigorous imprisonment for a further period of one year. 3. Prosecutrix, examined as PW-1, went to Police Station on 9.6.2002, in the company of her husband PW-2 Madan Singh and lodged report that on the previous day she went to a forest near her village to collect grass and around 12.30 PM, when she was still in the forest, appellant came there, snatched her scythe and threw it away and thereafter Whether reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? …2… pulled her towards bushes and committed rape on her. After committing the crime, appellant ran away from the spot, threatening the prosecutrix that she would be done to death, in case she reported the matter to anybody. When the prosecutrix tried to raise cries to attract help, appellant gagged her mouth with her own Dupatta. That day husband of the prosecutrix was not at home as he had gone to Nahan, in connection with some work. He returned around 9.30, in the night. She narrated the incident to him. Next day her husband took her to Police Station, where FIR Ext.PW1/A was lodged. 4. Appellant absconded. Police tried their best to arrest him, but could not succeed. Appellant was ultimately declared as Proclaimed Offender. It was in the year 2007 when the trial Court came to know that the appellant was lodged in Central Jail, Nahan, in connection with some other case. Thereafter his trial commenced. Prosecution examined the prosecutrix as PW-1, her husband Madan Singh as PW-2 and the doctor, who conducted prosecutrix’ medical examination, namely Rohit Thakur, as PW-8. 5. Prosecutrix, in her testimony as PW-1, narrated the version which she gave to the police, vide FIR Ext.PW1/A. There is no contradiction, worth the name, in her testimony as PW-1 and what she reported to the police, vide FIR Ext.PW1/A. Her husband Madan Singh, who appeared as PW- 2, stated that on 9.6.2002, when he returned home, around 9.30 PM, his wife told him that she had been raped by the …3… appellant, during day time in the forest, where she had gone to collect fodder. Testimony of the prosecutrix is thus corroborated by her husband PW-2 Madan Singh as also by the earliest version, which she gave to the police. 6. Testimony of the Prosecturix is further corroborated by the medical evidence. PW-8 Dr. Rohit Thakur stated that he noticed a scratch mark, measuring 4 cms, below the right eye, a bite mark over the left breast, measuring 2.5 x .25 cm, an abrasion mark over right shoulder, measuring 1 x 2 cms, on the person of the prosecutrix, when he conducted her medical examination, on 10.6.2002. The witness also proved the medical report Ext.PW1.B, which he issued after conducting the medical examination of the prosecutrix. 7. Appellant took the plea that he had been falsely implicated. However, neither he threw any suggestion to the prosecutrix and/or her husband, indicating that there could have been any motive for false implication, nor did he plead any such motive, in his own examination, under Section 313 Cr. P.C. That means the prosecutrix and her husband had no axe to grind, by falsely implicating the appellant. 8. No doubt appellant examined one witness, namely DW-1 Sirmaur Singh, a cousin of PW-2 Madan Singh, who testified that Madan Singh is a man of suspicious nature and he suspected that his wife was having illicit relations with the appellant and once in the month of January, 2002, he had visited him and told him about this suspicion, but his …4… testimony cannot be of any avail to the appellant, when he did not throw any suggestion to the prosecutrix or her husband on the lines of the facts testified by DW-1 Sirmaur Singh nor did he take such a plea, in his own statement, under Section 313 Cr. P.C. Therefore, it is quite likely that DW-1 Sirmaur Singh has been procured by the appellant to get out of his case. 9. In view of the above stated position, I am of the considered view that the appeal is without any merit. Hence, the same is dismissed. July 7, 2009 (ss) ( Surjit Singh ), J.