TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1972 (2) TMI 93
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....i deceased to sell that land to him but the deceased declined to do so. Madhandi constructed a fence around the land purchased by her, as a result of which the passage to the land of the accused was obstructed. About a week before the present occurrence, the accused removed some jack fruits from the land purchased by the deceased. Complaint about that was made by the deceased to the Panchayatdars. The Panchayatdars considered the matter, but the accused declined to abide by the decision of the Panchyatdars. On March 12, 1970 at about 12 noon, it is stated, Madhandi deceased left her house situated in village Sakkarapatti along with her daughter-in-law Kopia Chinthamani (PW 2), aged 10, for Valaparathi at a distance of about two miles from the village for grazing cattle. Shortly thereafter, Valanjiaraju (PW 1), stepson of Madhandi deceased, also went to Valaparathi and started cutting plants at a distance of about 250 feet from the place where the deceased was grazing the cattle. At about 2 p.m. the accused came to the place where Madhandi deceased was present and asked her whether she would give him the right of passage or not. The deceased replied in the negative. The accused t....
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....angalam. Dr. Pasha arrived at the place of occurrence at 12.30 p.m. on March 14, 1970 and performed post mortem examination on the dead body of Madhandi deceased. Inspector Rajagopal arrested the accused, according to the prosecution, at 5 a.m. on March 15, 1970 in a reserve forest about one mile from Seppangulam. The accused then stated that he had kept ornaments and knife in the house of Chakravarthi (PW 9) and would get the same recovered. The Inspector then went with accused to the house of Chakravarthi PW and from there recovered knife Ex. 1 and ornaments Exs. 2 to 8. The said ornaments belonged to Madhandi deceased. The knife was taken into possession and put into a, sealed parcel. The clothes which the accused was wearing were got removed and put into a sealed parcel. The parcels were sent to Chemical Examiner, whose report showed that neither the knife nor the clothes of the accused were stained with blood. At the trial the plea of the accused was denial simpliciter.According to the accused, the villagers came to know on the evening of March 12, 1470 that the deceased had been murdered. The accused along with the villagers went to the spot where the dead body of th....
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.... in our opinion, it would not be safe to maintain the conviction on the basis of that evidence. According to Kopia (PW 2), .the accused stabbed the deceased at about 2 p.m. Kopia raised alarm and immediately informed Valanjiaraju, who was cutting plants at a distance of about 250 feet from the place of occurrence. Valanjiaraju and Kopia then, came towards the place where the accused had assaulted the deceased, but the accused threatened them with knife. Valanjiaraju and Kopia thereupon went to the village abadi and informed the other villagers. Valanjiaraju accompanied by other villagers then went to the place of occurrence and found the dead body of Madhandi lying there with a number of injuries. According to document P. I Valanjiaraju made statement .about the occurrence to village munsif Muthuswami (PW 8) at about 9 a.m. on March 13, 1970. Formal first information report on the basis of the above statement was prepared at the police station at 11.45 a.m. The delay in lodging the report, according to the prosecution, was due to the fact that Muthuswami PW was away to another village in connection with some collection work and he returned to his house at 10. 30 p.m. Muthuswami ....
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....ore, essential that the delay in the lodging of the first information report should be satisfactorily explained. In the present case, Kopia, daughter-in-law of Madhandi deceased, according to the prosecution case, was present when the accused made murderous assault on the deceased. Valanjiaraju, stepson of the deceased, is also alleged to have arrived near the scene of occurrence on being told by Kopia. Neither of them, nor any other villager, who is stated to have been told about the occurrence by Valanjiaraju and Kopia, made any report at the police station for more than 20 hours after the occurrence, even though the police station is only two miles from the place of occurrence. The said circumstance, in our opinion, would raise considerable doubt regarding the veracity of the evidence of those two witnesses and point to an infirmity in that evidence as would render it unsafe to base the conviction of the accused-appellant upon it. As regards the alleged recovery of knife and ornaments at the instance of the accused, we find that the evidence consists of statements of Inspector Rajagopal (PW 13), Kati Goundar (PW 6) and Chakravarthi (PW 9). According to Chakravarthi (PW 9), th....