IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH SHIMLA Cr. Appeal No. 36 of 2005 Decided on: June 16, 2008. Raghu Ram …Appellant Versus State of H.P. …Respondent Coram The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Surjit Singh, Judge. The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Surinder, Judge. Whether approved for reporting?1 No. For the Appellant : Mr. Lovnesh Kanwar, Advocate. For the Respondent: Mr. P.K. Sharma, Addl. A.G. Surjit Singh, Judge (oral) This appeal against conviction and sentence is directed against the judgment of Sessions Court, whereby the appellant has been convicted of offence, under Section 304 (second part) of the Indian Penal Code and sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for 10 years and to pay a fine of Rs.20,000/-; in default of payment of fine to undergo rigorous imprisonment for a further period of one year. 2. Case of the prosecution, as per evidence on record, may be stated thus. Deceased Jagdish Chand organized a yajna at his place on 15.5.1999. Several relatives and friends of the deceased participated in the yajna. In the evening, some very close relatives of the deceased remained there. They Whether reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? …2… started consuming liquor. Those who sat with deceased Jagdish to drink were Khem Chand, Prabha, Sohan Singh and appellant- accused Raghu Ram, who is a nephew of the deceased. While consuming liquor, the deceased, the accused-appellant and the other persons started quarrelling. Accused-appellant became aggressive and hurled abuses. Upon that Jagdish Ram’s wife PW-1 Judhya Devi went inside the room where the above named persons were drinking. She asked the accused and other relatives to leave her house as their conduct and behaviour was unbecoming of guests. Then all of them came out in the courtyard. Appellant-accused started giving beatings to the sons and the wife of deceased Jagdish as also other persons. He then picked up a danda and hit the deceased on his head as a result of which he became unconscious. Next day, when being taken to the hospital, Jagdish died. Postmortem examination was conducted which indicated that there was sub- dural haemotoma and the centres of the brain were compressed. All these things lead to cardio respiratory arrest resulting in the death of Jagdish. 3. Prosecution examined PW-1 Judhya Devi, widow of the deceased, PW-2 Kunta Devi, PW-4 Sohan Singh, a son of the deceased, PW-5 Rakesh Kumar, a nephew of the deceased and PW-6 Anil Kumar, as eye witnesses. All of them testified that the appellant-accused dealt a blow of danda on the head of the deceased as a result of which he became unconscious and on the next following day, when he was being taken to the hospital, he breathed his last. …3… 4. We see no contradictions, inconsistencies and infirmities in the ocular version of the incident as narrated by the above named witnesses. Learned counsel representing the appellant also does not seriously dispute the finding recorded by the trial Court that the evidence of the above named witnesses does prove the incident, including the manner in which it took place and that it is the appellant who is responsible for the death of Jagdish. However, he says that the sentence awarded by the trial Court is too severe for the offence committed by the appellant. He has stated that it was a case of drunken brawl and there was no premeditation on the part of the appellant to cause any injury to anybody, leave alone the death of the deceased, who was his Mama (mother’s brother). It is also his submission that only one blow with danda was dealt and that the testimony of the Medical Officer PW-8 Dr. Vikash Gupta and the postmortem report Ext.PW8/A do not show that much force was used to deal the blow of danda, because there was no fracture of skull. 5. Looking to the facts and the circumstances of the case, particularly the fact that the deceased and the appellant- accused were close relatives and there was neither any motive nor any premeditation for the commission of the crime as also the fact that the appellant-accused happened to commit the crime in the course of a drinking bout, we see a good deal of force in the submission of the learned counsel for the appellant that the sentence awarded by the trial Court is too harsh. The record shows that the appellant-accused has been in jail for about four years. This period of four years, in our considered …4… view, is sufficient as sentence of substantive imprisonment, in the present case. Accordingly, we reduce the sentence from ten years rigorous imprisonment to the sentence already undergone. As regards the sentence of fine, we order the appellant-accused to pay fine of Rs.5000/-; in default of payment of fine to undergo rigorous imprisonment for a further period of six months. We order that the appellant shall be released from jail, immediately, on his depositing the aforesaid amount of fine, if not already deposited. In case the aforesaid amount of fine awarded by us is not paid, he shall have to serve out the sentence awarded in default of payment of fine, before he is released. 6. The appeal stands disposed of. ( Surjit Singh ), J. June 16, 2008, (ss) (Surinder Singh ), J.