IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD FRIDAY, THE TWENTY FIFTH DAY OF NOVEMBER TWO THOUSAND AND ELEVEN Present HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE G. BHAVANI PRASAD CRIMINAL APPEAL No. 516 of 2008 Between: State of A.P. rep.by Public Prosecutor. ... Appellant AND Boorla Apparao ... Respondent The Court made the following: HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE G. BHAVANI PRASAD CRIMINAL APPEAL No. 516 OF 2008 JUDGMENT: The Criminal Appeal is directed against the judgment in S.C.No.433 of 2004 on the file of the Assistant Sessions Judge, Tanuku, dated 09.12.2005, by which the accused was acquitted of the offences punishable under Sections 354, 506 (II) and 323 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. 2. The factual background for the appeal is that the Sub Inspector of Police, Tanuku Town Police Station filed a charge sheet in Crime No.174 of 2004 against the accused, alleging that the accused and Nasari Ratnam quarrelled about three months earlier resulting in Ratnam reporting to the police and the police warning the accused. On 09.10.2004 at about 12:00 Noon, the wife of the accused and Ratnam quarrelled. At about 6:00 PM on the same day, the accused went to Ratnam, who was at Municipal School and abused her. He had torn her blouse and outraged her modesty and ran away when she cried loudly. Isarapu Adinarayana and Kattula Veerabhadra Rao tried to save Ratnam from the hands of the accused, who came back within a few minutes and threatened to kill Ratnam, Adinarayana and Veerabhadra Rao. The accused caused simple injury to Ratnam, who gave report to the police, which was registered as Crime No.174 of 2004. The Investigating Officer inspected the scene of offence and got scene observation report prepared. The accused was arrested during the investigation and sent for remand and the Medical Officer opined that P.W.1 received simple injury. Hence, the charge. 3. On the Court taking cognizance of the offences and the accused appearing before it, the II Additional Judicial Magistrate of First Class, Tanuku furnished copies of the documents to the accused in P.R.C.No.60 2004. The case was committed to the Court of Session, which made it over to the trial Court and the trial Court framed charges under Section 354, 506 (II) and 323 of I.P.C against the accused, for which he pleaded not guilty. 4. The prosecution examined P.Ws.1 to 9 and marked Exs.P1 to P.5 and M.O.1 and Ex.D.1 during the trial and the accused denied all the incriminating circumstances appearing in the evidence against him when he was examined under Section 313 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973. No defence evidence was adduced. 5. The trial Court rendered the impugned judgment firstly noting that P.W.1 was the victim herself and P.Ws.3 and 4 were claimed to be independent eye witnesses. The trial Court noted that the evidence of P.Ws.3 and 4 was totally discrepant from the claims of P.W.1 and the evidence of P.Ws.3 and 4 showed that the blouse of P.W.1 was torn even prior to P.Ws.3 and 4 coming to the scene. The trial Court also noted that P.W.4 did not state anything about any attempt by the accused to commit rape on P.W.1 or to kill her. P.W.3 was noted by the trial Court to have stated on the other hand that the accused committed an attempt to murder and attempt to commit rape during the incident. The trial Court further recorded that P.W.3 did not observe the knife in the hands of the accused and P.Ws 3 and 4 did not state about the accused causing any injury to P.W.1. The wife of P.W.3 was noted to be the sister of P.W.1 and P.W.4 was noted to be a Carpenter working along with P.W.3 and therefore, they were not considered to be independent. The evidence of P.W.6, a student was not relied, as his presence was not spoken to by P.Ws.1, 3 and 4 and as a child witness being a student of P.W.1 cannot be considered to be independent. Any observation of the scene by P.W.7 was considered not relevant and P.W.8, the Doctor, was noted to be not the person, who examined P.W.1 for her injury. The Investigating Officer was noted to have just relied on P.Ws.1, 3, 4 and 6 and the trial Court ultimately concluded that the prosecution failed to establish the ingredients of the alleged offences and acquitted the accused. 6. The State through the learned Public Prosecutor filed the appeal contending that the ingredients of Sections 354 and 323 I.P.C have been satisfactorily made out by the prosecution through reliable, consistent and cogent evidence of the prosecution witnesses and the trial Court should not have acquitted the accused in spite of such evidence. 7. Sri Rudresh Deshpande, learned counsel representing the learned Public Prosecutor for the appellant and Sri N.Naga Raju, learned counsel representing Sri N.Krishna Murthy, learned counsel for the accused are heard. 8. The point for consideration is whether there are any strong grounds to interfere with the judgment of acquittal by the trial Court? 9. P.W.1 the alleged victim herself stated about the quarrel between her and the accused since three months prior to the alleged incident about the Municipal survey stone relating to which the police also administered a warning to the accused on her complaint three months prior to the incident. She also stated about the incident on that day also involving herself and the wife of the accused, in which the accused’s wife’s sister abused her in filthy language. The very claims show that the relationship between the accused and P.W.1 is so strained as to make foisting of a false case possible and therefore, it will be an accepted rule of prudence to look for satisfactory corroboration for the claims of the alleged victim in such circumstances from independent sources. The very scene of offence is a School where P.W.1 was working and at about 6:00 PM when some children were playing around, they heard the cries of P.W.1 and they ran away, according to P.W.6. It is unnatural to believe the accused would have fallen on P.W.1 in an attempt to commit rape on her due to an earlier dispute with him. It is further unnatural that in spite of P.Ws. 3 and 4 being attracted to the scene and attempting to catch hold of the accused, while he was outraging the modesty of P.W.1, the accused would have come there again to the scene with a knife after escaping from the scene in the first instance. Though Ex.P.1 complaint was given to the police by P.W.1 without much delay, M.O.1 stated to be a torn blouse, which was torn by the accused during the incident was not promptly recovered. The injury on the left wrist was stated by P.W.8 to be possible due to her bangles being broken during the scuffle, but not due to any overt acts of the accused. 10. P.W.2 is the husband of P.W.1, who is only a hearsay witness to whom P.W.1 allegedly informed about the incident and he also admitted that there were petty quarrels earlier between P.W.1 and the wife of the accused. 11. P.W.3 admitted that P.W.1 is his wife’s elder sister. P.W.3 and P.W.4 claimed that they were passing along the way at that time when they heard the cries of P.W.1. Obviously the place where P.Ws.3 and 4 were carrying on their profession of Carpentry is not anywhere near the scene and they are witnesses by chance, who cannot be relied on by themselves, in view of close relationship of P.W.3 with P.W.1 and P.Ws.3 and 4, being Carpenters working together. The evidence of P.Ws.3 and 4 hence, cannot be considered independent. P.W.3 stated that he came to know later that the accused came to kill with a knife and threatened to kill them, but he himself did not observe the knife, thus, belying the case of the prosecution that P.W.3 was an eyewitness to the entire incident as stated in the charge sheet P.W.3 also admitted the existence of civil disputes between P.W.1 and the accused and he does not even know whether the date of the incident was a holiday or working day for the school. Ex.P.3 did not refer to any torn blouse and even P.W.4 stated about the blouse being torn even by the time they went to the scene. What P.W.4 observed was the quarrel between P.W.1 and accused but not any attempt to rape or attempt to kill as stated by P.W.3. P.W.4 claimed to have left the school only when the accused came back with a knife contrary to the claims of P.W.3 and thus as found by the trial Court, the claims of P.Ws.3 and 4 are not consistent between themselves or consistent with the claims of P.W.1 about the manner of the incident. 12. P.W.5 also is a hearsay witness and P.W.6 a child witness was not referred to by P.Ws.1, 3 and 4. P.W.6 only stated about the accused abusing P.W.1 and insulting P.W.1 and also tearing her blouse. He did not state about any attempt by the accused to commit rape on PW.1 by falling on her or any attempt to commit murder of P.W.1 as was attempted to be projected by P.W.1. P.W.6 also admitted that his parents are very close to P.W.1 and are helping each other and he also therefore cannot be considered to be an independent witness. 13. P.W.7 was a witness to Ex.P.2 observation report and either he or the Investigating Officer did not throw any light on the incident proper. While P.W.9 in his evidence has stated about P.Ws.1 and 3 to 6 giving statements to him in a manner different than that projected by them before the Court, he had to admit that persons who are neighbours to the scene of offence did not cooperate at all in stating about the incident which may throw further doubts on the credibility of the prosecution story. If such an untoward incident happened to the knowledge of the immediate neighbours, they would not have failed to show sympathy to P.W.1 to respond to the request of the Investigating Officer to depose in this regard. The evidence of P.W.8, the Doctor, is that he did not examine the patient in respect of whom he issued Ex.P.3 wound certificate about the simple injury and he stated that P.W.1 herself did not state about the overt acts of the accused. 14. The accused during his examination under Section 313 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 denied happening of any such incident and while admitting the dispute between his wife and P.W.1 about the boundary survey stone, he claimed to have been falsely implicated in this case. 15. Though the allegations of the prosecution may create strong suspicion about the possibility of involvement of the accused in outraging the modesty of P.W.1 and threatening to kill her, any amount of suspicion cannot be concluded to be legal proof, however, strong it may be, and the evidence of P.Ws.1, 3, 4 and 6 being what it is and in the absence of any other corroboration from other evidence on record to the claims of P.W.1, the doubts entertained by the trial Court about want of proof of the guilt of the accused beyond reasonable doubt cannot be considered unreasonable or unacceptable and there appeared no strong reasons for interference with the acquittal of the accused by the trial Court in appeal. 16. In the result, the Criminal Appeal has to fail. Accordingly, the appeal is dismissed. ________________________ G. BHAVANI PRASAD, J NOVEMBER 25, 2011 YVL