IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA. Cr.A. No. 295 of 1998. Decided on: 7.5.2010. ___________________________________________________________ State of H.P. … Appellant. Versus Satish Kumar and others. … Respondents. ___________________________________________________________ Coram: Hon’ble Mr. Justice Surjit Singh, Judge. Hon’ble Mr. Justice V.K. Sharma, Judge. Whether approved for reporting?1 For the appellant : Mr. Rajinder Dogra, Addl. A.G. and Mr. Ramesh Thakur, Asstt. Advocate General. For the Respondents : Ms. Dushyant Dadhwal, Advocate. ___________________________________________________________ Surjit Singh, J. (Oral). This appeal by the State, under Section 378 Cr.P.C. seeks reversal of judgment of acquittal, dated 1.5.1998, delivered by the Sessions Court at Bilaspur, whereby respondents Satish Kumar and his father Sarwan Kumar and mother Sandhya Devi also respondent herein, have been acquitted of the charge, under Sections 498-A and 304-B read with Section 34 IPC. 2. Deceased Neelam Kumari, daughter of PW-3 Lekh Ram and PW-7 Gayatri Devi, was married to respondent Satish Kumar in July, 1990. It appears that respondent Satish Kumar was working at Delhi and the deceased was working as Teacher at a place called Tantha in Ghumarwin Tehsil of Bilaspur District, close to the village of her parents. Neelam Kumari died of aluminium phosphide poisoning on 13.11.1992. Intimation of the death was sent to the parents of the deceased. Police was also informed. PW-13 Inspector Pritam Singh, Police Station, Ghumarwin went to 1 Whether reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? 2 the spot and conducted inquest and prepared report Ext. PW3/B. He sent the dead body to the hospital for post mortem examination. PW4 Dr. N.K. Sankhyan conducted the post mortem and gave report Ext. PW-4/A, per which the cause of death was asphyxia. However, he reserved the final opinion till the report of the Chemical Examiner was received to whom viscera was sent. On receipt of the Chemical Examiner’s report, he gave the opinion that the deceased died of asphyxia caused by aluminium phosphide poisoning. 3. Case was registered, under Sections 304-B and 498- A IPC against the respondents on the report of PW-3 Lekh Ram, the father of the deceased. As per this report, all the three respondents used to harass the deceased for not bringing sufficient dowry and used to demand Rs. 50,000/- every now and then to make up for the insufficiency of dowry. Also, it was alleged that respondent Satish Kumar wanted to construct a house at Delhi for which he used to demand Rs. 50,000/- and when the demand was not matched, the deceased used to be harassed. 4. On 6.12.1992, a letter Ext. PW-3/C allegedly written by the deceased from village Tantha, where she was working as a Teacher on 13.11.1992, was produced to police along with its envelop Ext. PW-3/D. The envelop containing the aforesaid letter was stated to have been delivered to PW-3 Lekh Ram, the father of the deceased on 14.11.1992. 5. On completion of the investigation, police challaned all the three respondents. Prosecution mainly relied upon letter Ext. PW-3/C, which the deceased allegedly wrote to her parents on 13.11.1992 or say, on the very day of her dying due to poisoning. As per this letter, the deceased used to be harassed on the ground 3 that the dowry brought by her was insufficient and a demand of Rs. 50,000/- had been made to make up for the shortfall in dowry. 6. Trial Court has held that letter Ext. PW-3/C appears to have been fabricated after the registration of the case to strengthen the allegation against the respondents. 7. We have heard the learned Assistant Advocate General as also the learned counsel for the respondents and gone through the evidence. 8. There are two letters written by the deceased to her husband and also some letters written to her father, prior to the writing of letter Ext. PW-3/C. Letters, which the deceased wrote to her father, other than Ext.PW-3/C, are Ext. DE dated 21.2.1992 and Ext. DR which is undated. There is no mention of harassment or demand of Rs. 50,000/- or the allegation that the deceased used to be harassed or coerced for dowry. Letters written by the deceased to her husband are Ext. DC dated 27.1.1992, Ext. DD dated 7.2.1992, Ext. DF dated 9.9.1992, Ext. DG dated 26.9.1992 and Ext. DH dated 16.10.1992. From a reading of these letters, it appears that the deceased and respondent Satish Kumar were a happy couple and the deceased had no complaint against him and loved him like any other wife. 9. Not only this, we find on record another letter Ext. DS written by Lekh Ram (PW-3) to respondent Satish Kumar on 23.2.1988, that is, before the marriage, which suggests that the deceased and respondent Satish Kumar were in love with each other and the fact indicates that probably theirs was a love marriage, approved by their parents. 10. Since there is no indication of any demand, much less a demand for Rs. 50,000/- in the aforesaid two letters written by the 4 deceased to her father and also the letter written by the deceased to her husband indicate that the husband and the wife were having normal relations and there was no complaint by either of the two against each other, much reliance cannot be placed on the testimony of the father of the deceased, namely PW-3 Lekh Ram, mother of the deceased PW-7 Gayatri Devi and brother of the deceased, namely PW-6 Rajiv Kumar about the alleged demand for Rs. 50,000/-. 11. We agree with the observations made by the trial Court that letter Ext. PW-3/C appears to have been created after the death of the deceased. On the top of the letter, place mentioned is Tantha and the date mentioned is 13.11.1992. The letter, according to PW-3 Lekh Ram, was received by him in a cover Ext. PW-3/D, on 14.11.1992. Envelop Ext. PW-3/D bears two stamps of Post Office of Tantha and the date appearing in the centre of these circular stamp impressions is 14.11.1992, that is to say, the date next following the date of death of Neelam Kumari. Tantha is the post office which serves the village of Lekh Ram (PW-3). Lekh Ram (PW-3) is a Teacher. Possibility of his having manipulated the stamps on this envelop in connivance with some officials working in the post office cannot be ruled out. Moreover, envelop Ext. PW-3/D containing letter Ext. PW-3/C is claimed by PW-3 Lekh Ram to have been delivered to him on 14.11.1992, but it was handed over to the police on 6.12.1992. Delay of 22 days remains unexplained. 12. Though, there is opinion of handwriting expert, namely PW-15 Dr. B.A. Vaid to the effect that letter Ext. PW-3/C is written by the same person who has written letter Ext. PW-3/E and Ext. PW-3/E is stated to be an application submitted by the deceased to the headmaster of the school, in which she was 5 working, by PW-16 Bhagwan Dass, yet Ext. PW-3/E has not been proved to be in the hand of the deceased. PW-16 Bhagwan Dass simply stated that he had produced this letter from the record to the police during investigation of the case on 14.9.1993, but he did not know whether the application was in the handwriting of the deceased. The witness stated that the file from which the application had been produced did not have any pagination and he could not admit or deny that the application has been placed in the file stealthily after the death of Neelam Kumari. Also, we find on the record another report of handwriting expert, that is, Ext.DW-2/A given by Dr. B.R. Sharma, a retired Government Examiner. The report has been proved by said Dr. B.R. Sharma, who appeared as DW-2. As per this report, writing Ext. PW-3/C does not appear to be in the hand of the same person, who is the author of writings Ext. DC to Ext. DH, which are the letters written by the deceased to her father and husband. It is admitted by PW-3 Lekh Ram, father of the deceased that the letters Ext. DC to Ext. DH are in the hand of the deceased. 13. In view of the above stated position, we are of the considered view that the judgment of acquittal, passed by the trial Court, in this case, does not call for any interference. Hence, the appeal is dismissed. (Surjit Singh) Judge. (V.K. Sharma) Judge. May 7, 2010. (cr)