Case: Arumuga Nadar Vs. State of Tamil Nadu

The prelude to the present occurrence appears to be an incident in April, 1969 when at about 10.30 p.m. accused 1 Ratnasami Nadar entered the house of PW 5 who flashed his torchlight and saw the accused jumping out of the compound. Thereafter PW 5 made a complaint to the villagers resulting in the concerning of the panchayat on June 27, 1969, where the first accused was interrogated by the panchayat and this was strongly resented by the appellant who considered it as a great insult to his respectable family. The deceased Samuel is alleged to have told the appellant that the question of respectability of his family was wholly irrelevant and he should ask his brother accused 1 to express regret for his conduct but the accused 1 flatly refused to do so and threatened the deceased. On the day of occurrence i.e. June 27, 1969 at about 12.45 p.m. the deceased Samuel was standing in front of the shop of PW 3 waiting for a jeep to go to Thisaiyanvilai when both the accused suddenly emerged from the north and at that time accused 1 was armed with "vettu aruval" (spear). The appellant on seeing the deceased Samuel exhorted the first accused to kill the deceased as he has been constantly insulting the family of the appellant. Thereupon the first accused assaulted the deceased with vettu aruval and inflicted several injuries on him. The appellant, however, left the place of occurrence and when the witnesses gathered at the spot, the first accused also ran away. PW 4 at the request of PW 2 proceeded to Thisayanvilai village to bring a jeep in order to take the deceased to the hospital or to the police station. At about 3.15 p.m. the jeep was brought to the place of occurrence from where the deceased was taken in the jeep to the police station by PWs 1 and 2. They reached the police station at 4.00 p.m. and lodged the F.I.R. with theof Police PW 15. The deceased Samuel was sent to the government hospital in the same jeep where he reached nearabout 5.15 p.m. The doctor, however, sent the injured to the government hospital at Paayamkotta for better medical treatment where he was admitted at about 6.40 p.m. As the condition of the deceased grew worse, PW 14 a magistrate of the area was sent for and he recorded the dying declaration of the deceased Samuel which is Ext.This dying declaration was recorded between 7.15 and 7.30 p.m. in the presence of the doctor PW 8 when the deceased was fully conscious. Even Ext.the F.I.R. was the statement given by the deceased regarding the circumstances relating to his death.2. The defence pleaded innocence and contended that the accused were falsely implicated due to enmity. The trial Judge convicted both the accused, namely, the first accused under Section 302 I.P.C. and the appellant under Section 302/109 I.P.C. i.e. for committing abetment of the murder of the deceased. The accused file an appeal to the High Court which was dismissed and an application for leave to appeal to this Court met a similar fate. The appellant alone then came up to this Court and obtained special leave and hence this appeal before us.

Court's reasoning:
7. Lastly it was suggested that no reliance should be placed on the evidence of PW 3 because he was an accused in a murder case and was convicted. It appears from the statement of PW 3 inthat the murder case was tried as far back as 1932 about 43 years ago. In view of the huge lapse of time between his conviction and the present occurrence, it is difficult to discard the testimony of this witness on this ground alone. Even PW 1 who is said to be an enemy of the accused admitted that there was some dispute between him and the appellant but he testified inthat the dispute had been settled a year ago.8. The position, therefore, is that PWs 1, 2 and 3 are absolutely independent witnesses and there is no reason why they should falsely implicate the appellant. As the evidence of these eyewitnesses is further corroborated by the two dying declarations Exts.the case against the appellant is proved to the hilt. We therefore, find ourselves in complete agreement with the view taken by the Sessions Judge and the High Court and hold that the appellant was rightly convicted under Section 302/109 I.P.C. The main accused, namely, accused 1 Ratnasami Nadar has not filed any appeal in thishave gone through both these documents and we find it difficult to disbelieve any of them. Both the dying declarations made by the deceased contain a ring of truth and it seems that the deceased had given a very clear though brief narrative of what had happened. These two documents coupled with the evidence of PWs 1, 2 and 3 completely dislodge the effect of the omission on the part of PW 4 to mention the presence of the appellant.