Delhi HC quashes life imprisonment of 5 family members in murder case

New Delhi [India], August 23 (ANI): The Delhi High Court on Monday set aside the conviction of five members of a family, including a woman for the murder of a person, giving them the benefit of doubt. The court also quashed the life imprisonment awarded to all the convicts.
The division bench of Justices Sidharth Mridul and Anup Jairam Bhambhani allowed the appeals filed by Film Kaur alias Gunni, her father Ram Singh, Jaswant Singh, Bunti Singh, and Deepak against their conviction and sentence awarded by the Rohini District Court in the matter related to the murder of Sonu.
The High Court termed the testimony of Phool Kaur, the mother of the deceased as contradictory. She was the only eyewitness in the case.
Her son was allegedly murdered by his son’s estranged wife along with her family members and a friend. The incident took place in the Sultanpuri area on the night of October 11, 2018.
The appellants were convicted by the trial court in March 2020 and were awarded a life sentence in July 2020, for the murder of Sonu by way of inflicting deadly injuries upon the deceased.
The bench while granting the relief said, “However, what belies the testimony of the said eye witness’s credibility, is her conduct immediately after the alleged assault, in neither calling for help, nor calling the police, nor taking any steps to attend to her son medically.”
The bench pointed out that according to the testimony of the mother of the deceased, she didn’t do anything until 5 am in the morning, despite her son bleeding profusely.
“It was natural and expected of the mother to have taken steps to move her son to a hospital or other medical facility. The fact that she did not do anything until 5 am the next morning, makes her testimony wholly unreliable,” the high court said.
The bench even accepted that the death is unnatural with some blatant attack on the head of the deceased, but that is not sufficient to impute guilt as the witness doesn’t inspire confidence.
The bench further observed, “Although the medical evidence including MLC and post mortem report, it is evident that the injured suffered an unnatural death by reason of craniocerebral damage as a result of blunt force or object impact, that alone is not sufficient to impute the guilt of the appellants or any of them. “
The bench said that absent any credible testimony connecting the appellants to the offense, we find ourselves unable to agree with the findings returned by the trial court, based on which the appellants were convicted.
The appellant Deepak and Ram Singh had challenged the judgment through advocate Ajay Verma. He argued that although the conviction can be based on the testimony of the sole eyewitness only when the same is found cogent, of sterling quality, and inspires confidence. (ANI)