Case: Ashok Kumar Chatterjee Vs. State of Madhya Pradesh

replied that Ravindra had gone to Bombay in search of some employment. The conduct of the appellant in giving this manifestly blatant false reply to PW 2s enquiry, spells out his guilty conscience. The number of letters namely Exs. P-13 to P-15, Exs. P-29 and P-31 written in Bengali and Hindi were seized from the house. These letters are proved to be in the handwriting of the appellant, as seen from the evidence of PW 22 and PW 23 who were the State Examiners of Questioned Documents. PW 2 who claims to have studied up to 3rd standard has also deposed that the writing of those letters are in the handwriting of the appellant. In fact the accused also did not deny his handwriting but would try to explain that those letters were got written under pressure brought by the police on him. In these letters which were not posted, the accused had confessed that he had murdered the deceased. There is one more clinching evidence connecting the appellant with the crime in question is the contents of the postcard (Ex. P-104). This postcard had been posted at Bhatapara on July 13, 1976 i. e. on the very same day of the suicidal death of Pritosh. Much argument was advanced on this postcard. According to the prosecution this postcard which was posted at Bhatapara on July 13, 1976 reached the appellants father on July 17, 1976 at Kalopur. This postcard is written in Bengali. PW 23 has testified that the writing in the postcard is that of the appellant. This Ex. P-104 is dated July 11, 1976. The learned counsel for the defence advanced his argument contending that since the postcard is dated July 11, 1976, the appellant should have been taken to the police custody even much earlier to July 13, 111976 and this letter was fabricated. We are unable to accept this contention. In fact, a similar argument was raised before the High Court which repelled the same. Admittedly Pritosh committed suicide on July 13, 1976. In the postcard there is reference to the death of Pritosh Therefore, it is evident that this postcard should have been written after the death of Pritosh and then posted. Presumably, the appellant would have put the date on the postcard as July 11, 1976 by mistake. In view of the surrounding circumstances and the contents found in the postcard we are in total agreement with the finding of the High Court that the appellant should have put the date by mistake, and hold that this argument of the learned counsel for the appellant is not acceptable. The contents of this letter clearly show that Ravindra was murdered by the appellant on June 10, 1976 and that the appellant coming to know about the suicide of his cousin brother, Pritosh had decided to surrender before the police and suffer the consequences. Though the appellant in general had stated that he was tortured by the police and pressurised to write certain letters and documents and to sign them, he when specifically questioned under Section 313 CPC answered that he did not know anything about those letters 36. The learned defence counsel in support of his contention that there was police torture would draw the attention of this Court to certain admissions of PW 2 in the cross-examination admitting that the police had harassed all of them and persistently enquired about the reason for Pritosh to commit suicide, and that the appellant on being arrested by the police was highly perplexed and all of them went on admitting what the police said. We have carefully scanned these admissions of PW 2 but found that these admissions could not in any way affect the veracity of the prosecution case. As we have pointed out Pritosh committed suicide in very tragic circumstances by throwing himself before a running train only after PW 2 had approached the police by lodging Ex. P-82 and handing over two photographs of her son with the request to make an investigation about the missing of her son. Evidently Pritosh who on being put to painful ignominy by his obnoxious conduct of having sexual relationship with his own daughter should have resorted to putting an end to his life apprehending that the whole shameful intrigue would come out and he would be exposed to the public. PW 2 by then had not come out with the story of her husbands abnormal sexual behaviour. Therefore, the police in order to unearth the real cause for the suicidal death Pritosh would have taken all the inmates of the house to the police station and subjected them to intensive and searching examination. It was only during such examination of these witnesses over the cause of the death of Pritosh, the whole truth about this case came out. It is not surprising that the appellant would have been in an agitated and perplexed state of mind because he was in exclusive knowledge of his own conduct of having committed the murder of the deceased which led to the suicidal death of Pritosh who on account of his uncivilized and filthy conduct in our opinion was only a beast in the human form37. Hence we hold that this argument of the earned counsel does not merit consideration38. For all the discussions made above we are of the view that there are number of impelling circumstances attending this case leading to an irresistible and inescapable conclusion that it was the appellant and the appellant alone who caused the death of the deceased, Ravindra in a very ghastly manner by cutting him into pieces and throwing his various parts of body at different parts of the city, Bhatapara and there cannot be any dispute that this cold-blooded murder is diabolical in conception and extremely cruel in execution. The evaluation of the findings of the High Court does not suffer from any illegality, or manifest error or perversity nor it has overlooked or wrongly discarded any vital piece of evidence.

Decision (1 = appeal accepted, 0 = rejected): 0

Explanation:
0[ds]Evidently Pritosh who on being put to painful ignominy by his obnoxious conduct of having sexual relationship with his own daughter should have resorted to putting an end to his life apprehending that the whole shameful intrigue would come out and he would be exposed to the public. PW 2 by then had not come out with the story of her husbands abnormal sexual behaviour. Therefore, the police in order to unearth the real cause for the suicidal death Pritosh would have taken all the inmates of the house to the police station and subjected them to intensive and searching examination. It was only during such examination of these witnesses over the cause of the death of Pritosh, the whole truth about this case came out. It is not surprising that the appellant would have been in an agitated and perplexed state of mind because he was in exclusive knowledge of his own conduct of having committed the murder of the deceased which led to the suicidal death of Pritosh who on account of his uncivilized and filthy conduct in our opinion was only a beast in the humanhave carefully scanned these admissions of PW 2 but found that these admissions could not in any way affect the veracity of the prosecution case. As we have pointed out Pritosh committed suicide in very tragic circumstances by throwing himself before a running train only after PW 2 had approached the police by lodging Ex.and handing over two photographs of her son with the request to make an investigation about the missing of her son.Evidently Pritosh who on being put to painful ignominy by his obnoxious conduct of having sexual relationship with his own daughter should have resorted to putting an end to his life apprehending that the whole shameful intrigue would come out and he would be exposed to the public. PW 2 by then had not come out with the story of her husbands abnormal sexual behaviour. Therefore, the police in order to unearth the real cause for the suicidal death Pritosh would have taken all the inmates of the house to the police station and subjected them to intensive and searching examination. It was only during such examination of these witnesses over the cause of the death of Pritosh, the whole truth about this case came out. It is not surprising that the appellant would have been in an agitated and perplexed state of mind because he was in exclusive knowledge of his own conduct of having committed the murder of the deceased which led to the suicidal death of Pritosh who on account of his uncivilized and filthy conduct in our opinion was only a beast in the humanform37. Hence we hold that this argument of the earned counsel does not merit consideration38. For all the discussions made above we are of the view that there are number of impelling circumstances attending this case leading to an irresistible and inescapable conclusion that it was the appellant and the appellant alone who caused the death of the deceased, Ravindra in a very ghastly manner by cutting him into pieces and throwing his various parts of body at different parts of the city, Bhatapara and there cannot be any dispute that thismurder is diabolical in conception and extremely cruel in execution. The evaluation of the findings of the High Court does not suffer from any illegality, or manifest error or perversity nor it has overlooked or wrongly discarded any vital piece of evidence.