The Supreme Court has acquitted four accused persons in a 2001 murder case from Odisha, holding that the prosecution failed to establish their involvement beyond reasonable doubt. 

The Bench of Justice M.M. Sundresh and Justice Prasanna B. Varale found material inconsistencies in the testimony of the alleged eyewitnesses and concluded that the circumstances relied upon by the prosecution did not form a complete and unbroken chain pointing exclusively towards the guilt of the accused.

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The prosecution case related to the killing of Dhruba Pradhan on May 14, 2001. According to the prosecution, one of the accused allegedly visited the informant’s house at around 4 PM and threatened to kill the deceased. Later, at about 7 PM, a group of accused persons allegedly arrived armed with weapons and searched for the deceased. 

The prosecution alleged that the deceased was intercepted while travelling on a motorcycle at Agi Chhak. He was allegedly forcibly taken into a nearby paddy field and assaulted with various weapons and objects, including a laterite stone, iron rod and bhujali. He subsequently died from his injuries, and his motorcycle was thrown into a pond. 

An FIR was lodged at around 2 AM on May 15, 2001. During investigation, the authorities seized various articles from the spot, including the deceased’s chopped right wrist, a laterite stone and a lathi. A chargesheet was eventually filed against 18 accused persons. Following the death of one accused and the splitting up of proceedings against three absconding accused, 14 persons faced trial. 

The Trial Court framed charges under Sections 148, 506/149 and 302/149 of the IPC. The prosecution examined 26 witnesses, while the defence examined one witness. 

By judgment dated January 28, 2004, the Trial Court convicted six accused persons, including the present appellants, while acquitting eight others by giving them the benefit of doubt. The convicted accused were sentenced to life imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 3,000 each, with a further six months’ rigorous imprisonment in default of payment of fine. 

The accused challenged their convictions before the Orissa High Court. During the pendency of the proceedings before the Supreme Court, two of the six convicted accused died and the appeals stood abated against them. The Supreme Court therefore considered the appeals concerning the remaining four accused. 

An important feature of the case was the High Court’s treatment of the alleged eyewitness testimony. The High Court had discarded the eyewitness account, observing that the witnesses could not have identified the assailants in the pitch-dark night merely from the sound of the assault. Nevertheless, it upheld the convictions on the basis of circumstantial evidence. 

Before the Supreme Court, the appellants argued that once the eyewitness testimony had been rejected, the prosecution could not sustain the conviction on the same evidentiary foundation. They also highlighted inconsistencies between the witnesses and argued that the prosecution had failed to exclude the possibility of involvement by other persons. 

The defence also pointed out that the deceased allegedly had several criminal cases pending against him and that, according to the evidence, a large number of villagers had been searching for him on the night of the incident. The appellants therefore argued that the possibility of their false implication could not be ruled out. 

The Supreme Court closely examined the testimony of the alleged eyewitnesses. It noted that the prosecution primarily relied upon PWs 3, 4, 10, 11, 17 and 26, all of whom were related to the deceased. PW-3 and PW-4 were his brothers, while the other witnesses were his sisters-in-law. 

The Court found a significant inconsistency concerning the presence of the witnesses at the scene. PW-3’s version indicated that he was not present at the spot when the incident occurred. More importantly, the FIR lodged by him stated that only PW-17 and PW-26 had witnessed the occurrence. PW-4, however, gave a materially different account and claimed that PW-3 and the other witnesses were present and observing the accused at the time of the incident. 

According to the Supreme Court, this contradiction created a significant inconsistency in the prosecution’s case.

The Court also considered whether the alleged eyewitnesses could realistically have identified the assailants under the circumstances.

The incident took place during a pitch-dark night, and the alleged witnesses were at a considerable distance from the occurrence. The Supreme Court referred to its earlier decision in State of U.P. v. Ashok Kumar, where identification of accused persons from a substantial distance at night had been found unreliable even in the presence of moonlight. 

The Court further relied upon Tamilselvan v. State, which dealt with identification where the accused themselves were carrying torches. The Court in that case had observed that where the assailants were carrying the torches, the light could actually make it difficult for witnesses to identify them, particularly when the witnesses themselves were not directing a source of light towards the assailants. 

Applying these principles, the Supreme Court held that the alleged eyewitnesses could not safely be relied upon to establish either that they had witnessed the assault or that they had identified the assailants merely from the sounds of the assault. 

Once the ocular evidence was discarded, the prosecution’s case necessarily rested entirely on circumstantial evidence. The Supreme Court therefore examined whether the circumstances relied upon by the High Court satisfied the settled legal standard governing conviction based on circumstantial evidence. 

The Court referred to the five principles laid down in Sharad Birdhichand Sarda v. State of Maharashtra. It reiterated that the circumstances relied upon must first be fully established; they must be consistent only with the guilt of the accused; they must be conclusive; they must exclude every reasonable hypothesis other than guilt; and the chain of evidence must be so complete that there remains no reasonable ground consistent with the innocence of the accused. 

The Court also referred to Kamal v. State (NCT of Delhi) and reiterated the fundamental principle that however strong a suspicion may be, it cannot substitute proof beyond reasonable doubt. 

The Supreme Court identified the circumstances relied upon by the High Court, including the alleged threat to the deceased, the arrival of armed accused persons at his house, the search for him by a large group of people, the alleged interception and assault at Agi Chhak, identification through torchlight and voice, the sounds of assault heard by witnesses, the alleged waiting by the accused after the assault and the recovery of weapons and the deceased’s motorcycle. 

The Court found that several of these circumstances substantially depended upon the testimonies of the same prosecution witnesses whose evidence had already been found materially inconsistent. 

The Court also questioned the conduct attributed to the witnesses. It noted that although PW-3 claimed to be an eyewitness, he could not specify which weapon was carried by which accused. Further, according to his own testimony, after the assault he returned home and came back to the spot two hours later, without making an attempt to inform other family members or villagers about the serious incident. 

The Supreme Court separately considered the prosecution’s theory concerning the alleged 53-kg laterite stone. The Court noted that there was no material establishing how such a heavy stone was brought to the scene or who brought it. More importantly, the prosecution had not recovered the alleged 53-kg laterite stone said to have been used in the commission of the offence. 

The Court also referred to the medical officer’s evidence, according to which a laterite stone such as the one marked as MO3 could potentially cause fracture and brain haemorrhage if thrown from a height of two feet. However, the medical officer also stated that no weapon of offence, including the laterite stone, had been sent to him by the Investigating Officer for his opinion. 

Referring to Abdul Nassar v. State of Kerala, the Supreme Court reiterated that courts must meticulously examine every link in a case based on circumstantial evidence to determine whether each circumstance has been independently proved and whether, taken collectively, the circumstances establish an unbroken chain consistent only with the guilt of the accused. 

The Court emphasized that a conviction based on circumstantial evidence cannot rest on individual circumstances that merely raise suspicion. Every circumstance must be established beyond doubt, and the circumstances collectively must point towards the guilt of the accused while excluding reasonable alternatives. 

On an overall assessment, the Supreme Court concluded that the prosecution had failed to establish a complete and consistent chain of circumstances excluding every hypothesis other than the guilt of the appellants. According to the Court, the evidence contained substantial gaps that created reasonable doubt regarding their involvement. 

The Court accordingly held that the High Court was not justified in affirming the convictions and that the appellants were entitled to the benefit of doubt. 

Consequently, the Supreme Court allowed the appeals and quashed and set aside both the Orissa High Court’s judgment dated May 6, 2009 and the Trial Court’s judgment dated January 28, 2004 convicting and sentencing the appellants.

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