Raghav Prapanna Tripathi vs The State Of Uttar Pradesh
Rewritten Version Notice: This is a rewritten version of the original judgment.
Court: Supreme Court of India
Case Number: Criminal Appeal No. 72 of 1962
Decision Date: 04/05/1962
Coram: Raghubar Dayal, S.K. Das, J.L. Kapur, A.K. Sarkar, M. Hidayatullah
In the matter titled Raghav Prapanna Tripathi versus The State of Uttar Pradesh, the judgment was delivered on 4 May 1962 by the Supreme Court of India. The opinion was authored by Justice Raghubar Dayal and the bench comprised Justices Raghubar Dayal, S. K. Das, J. L. Kapur, A. K. Sarkar, and M. Hidayatullah. The petitioner in the case was Raghav Prapanna Tripathi and the respondent was the State of Uttar Pradesh. The judgment is reported in 1963 AIR 74 and 1962 SCR (3) 239, and the principal statutory provisions discussed were Sections 176, 201, and 302 of the Indian Penal Code, concerning circumstantial evidence in murder cases, the absence of direct proof, and the sufficiency of inferences drawn from the accused’s absconding, the non‑recovery of a jeep, and the presence of the accused at the house where the alleged murder took place.
The headnote records that the appellants were prosecuted and remanded to the Sessions Court for trial. Raghav Tripathi was convicted and sentenced to death under Section 302 of the IPC. He, together with Jai Devi (his mother), Ramanuj Das, Mohan Singh, and Udham Singh, were found guilty under Section 201 of the IPC, while Ramanuj Das also faced conviction under Section 176. Their appeals against the convictions were rejected by the High Court, and they obtained special leave to approach this Court. The appeal of Raghav Tripathi, Mohan Singh and Udham Singh was allowed by a majority of the bench, the appeal of Ramanuj Das and Jai Devi under Section 201 was allowed unanimously, and the appeal of Ramanuj Das under Section 176 was allowed by a majority.
Justice Kapur and Justice Hidayatullah, dissenting, held that no direct evidence linked Raghav Tripathi to the murder of Kamla and Madhusudan, nor to the alleged removal of their bodies in a jeep. Likewise, no direct proof established that Ramanuj Das or any other accused participated in the removal of the dead bodies from the house. The prosecution’s case rested entirely on circumstantial evidence. The circumstances proved against Raghav Tripathi were deemed insufficient to sustain a finding of his having committed the murder. While his absconding might lend some weight to other incriminating material, by itself it did not constitute substantive proof of guilt. The court considered it excessive to infer that, had the jeep been recovered, it would have yielded evidence of blood‑stains or its use in disposing of the bodies; such a non‑recovery was held to have no evidential value. No evidence was presented regarding any role played by Ramanuj Das or Jai Devi in the removal of the bodies, and mere presence in the house, even if they might have known of the removal, could not by itself establish assistance in that act. Consequently, the conviction of the appellant was found unjustified on the material before the Court, as expressed by Justices Kapur and Hidayatullah.
The judgment further noted the strained relations between husband and wife, the motive to escape the giving of money and land as maintenance to the wife or child, suddenly leaving the village at
The Court observed that on the night when Kamla and her son disappeared together with two other persons, no search was conducted for Kamla and the conduct of Raghav was described as absolutely callous; later he offered a false explanation and subsequently absconded, and these circumstances justified the lower courts in concluding that Kamla and her son had been murdered and that Raghav possessed a predominant motive to commit the murder. The incriminating facts established against Raghav could not be explained by any hypothesis other than his guilt. The lower courts applied the correct legal principles in finding Raghav guilty and there was no reason for the appellate Court to disagree with those conclusions. The fact that the jeep was not produced was a circumstance adverse to Raghav, and the lower courts were entitled to consider it. Articles such as jeeps do not simply vanish into thin air; when a vehicle disappears and cannot be traced, and when the allegation is that it was used to carry away dead bodies, its non‑production or failure to be found is a circumstance that a Court may take into account in assessing the guilt of an accused. No offence under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code was established against Ramanuj Das and Jai Devi. Section 201 requires that a person cause any evidence of the commission of the offence to disappear or give any information respecting the offence which the person knows or believes to be false. It was not proved that the two appellants caused any evidence to disappear. While there may be a strong suspicion that, if dead bodies were removed from the house or blood was washed, the persons in the position of the two appellants must have had a hand in it, that suspicion nevertheless remained only a suspicion, albeit a strong one. Mere absconding by the appellants would not fill the evidential gap required to prove the ingredients of section 201. The Court referred to authorities including Anant Chintaman Lagu v. The State of Bombay, [1960] 2 S.C.R. 460; Govinda Reddy v. The State of Mysore, A.I.R. 1960 S.C. 29; Stephen Seneviratnan v. The King, A.I.R. 1936 P.C. 289; Towell’s case, (1854) 2 C & K 309; Rex v. Horry, [1952] N.Z.L.R. 11; Regina v. Onufrejczyk, (1955) 1 Q.B. 338, which were relied upon; and also Rex v. Hodge, (1833) 2 Lew. 227, which was referred to. The judgment was delivered by the learned judges of the Criminal Appellate Jurisdiction in Criminal Appeal No. 72 of 1962, arising by special leave from the judgment and order dated 8 February 1962 of the Allahabad High Court in Criminal Appeals Nos. 1728 and 1739 of 1961 and Referred No. 125 of 1961. Counsel for the appellants and counsel for the respondent were listed, and the judgment of the learned judges Das, Sarkar, Dayal and others was recorded on 4 May 1962, with the judgment of Dayal, J. delivered by Dayal, J., and the judgment of Kapur and Hidayatullah, J. delivered by Kapur, J.
In the order of the High Court of Allahabad, the appellants’ challenge to their convictions by the Sessions Judge of Etawah was rejected. The court affirmed that Raghav Prapanna Tripathi, referred to as Raghav, had been found guilty of murder under section 302 of the Indian Penal Code and sentenced to death. The same judgment also held that Raghav and the other accused were guilty of the offence of causing disappearance of evidence under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code. Additionally, Ramanuj Das was convicted for an offence punishable under section 176 of the Indian Penal Code. The prosecution’s case, in summary, contended that on the evening of 5 April 1961, at approximately sunset, Raghav shot his first wife Kamla and their four‑year‑old son Madhusudhan to death at their residence in the village of Hamirpur Roora, District Etawah. The motive alleged by the prosecution was Raghav’s indifference to Kamla and his alleged maltreatment of her after he had married a second woman, Bimla, in 1954. The prosecution asserted that Kamla had been sent to her father’s home for about two years because of the alleged ill‑treatment she suffered at Raghav’s hands, but she was later brought back by Ramanuj Das in 1960. Ramanuj Das purportedly promised Kamla’s father that he would ensure her welfare, would transfer ninety bighas of land to her, and would pay her a sum of ten thousand rupees. On the morning of 5 April 1961, Ramanuj Das is said to have promised Lakhan Prasad that the necessary transfer deed would be executed on the following Monday, during which conversation Raghav allegedly left the scene, harbouring resentment at the prospect of such a large transfer of property and cash that would benefit Kamla. This resentment, according to the prosecution, prompted Raghav to murder his wife and son that evening. The prosecution further sought to demonstrate the connection between Ramanuj Das and the other accused with Raghav, alleging that this relationship led them to conceal evidence of the murders in order to shield Raghav from legal punishment, thereby constituting the offence under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code. The prosecution described the social and familial setting: Lachman Das, the Mahant of the temple in Hamirpur Roora, had disciples including Narayan Das, Raghav’s father, and Ramanuj Das. After Lachman Das’s death, Ramanuj Das succeeded him as Mahant although Narayan Das, being senior, had taken up secular life. The household comprised Ramanuj Das, Raghav, his mother Jai Devi, Raghav’s wife Kamla, and the child Madhusudhan, all living together as a joint Hindu family in the same house that also housed the temple. Mohan Singh and Udham Singh were alleged to be servants of Ramanuj Das. Raghav primarily resided in Lucknow with his second wife Bimla and his sisters who were studying there; he was a law graduate and owned a jeep bearing registration number US J 3807. No one reported the registration details to the police for about two days. On 7 April 1961, at 9:20 a.m., a watchman named Khushali lodged a report at the Airwa Katra police station in Etawah district.
When the report was filed, the police station in Etawah did not have a Station Officer on duty. The informant reported that on the night two days earlier, Raghav, son of Narain Das, had allegedly shot his wife and son with the gun of Mahant Ramanuj Das. According to the informant, the two dead bodies were taken away in a car and rumors of the incident spread throughout the village. After hearing the rumors, the informant went to the Mahant, who also served as the village Pradhan, and asked him for a written statement to present to the police. The Mahant told the informant to wait and to go to the police only after Thakur Dalganjan Singh had arrived, but the informant ignored this instruction and proceeded to file a report. Sub‑Inspector Brij Raj Singh Tomer, the Station Officer of Airwa Katra, received a copy of the first‑information‑report at eleven o’clock in the morning and immediately set out for the scene, arriving at two p.m. He inspected the residence of Ramanuj Das, prepared a site plan, and identified approximately eleven locations where blood‑stained plaster appeared. He removed the stained plaster from each of those locations, placed each piece in a separate packet and then sealed all eleven packets together in a single bundle. The chemical examiner subsequently reported that five of the eleven plaster packets contained blood stains, while the serologist was unable to determine the blood’s origin because it had disintegrated. The precise locations of the blood‑stained plasters were not clearly documented, but the evidence showed that at least two pieces came from the southern outer room. Other stained pieces were thought to have been taken from the outer wall of the northern room, the roof of the temple, and the floor of the southern inner room. Sub‑Inspector Brij Raj Singh Tomer did not locate any of the accused persons in the village during his investigation. On 12 April 1961, Deputy Superintendent of Police Bashir Hussain visited the site and collected soil suspected of being blood‑stained from the parnalas of the roof and from the ground where water from the parnalas fell. He divided the collected material into seven separate packets, sealed them together in a bundle, and submitted them for laboratory analysis. The chemical examiner found that soil from two of the seven packets showed evidence of blood, while the serologist again could not identify the blood’s source because of disintegration. On 16 April 1961, Bashir Hussain retrieved a shirt and a pair of pyjamas belonging to Raghav from Snowhite Cleaners & Dyers in Lucknow, as they were suspected of bearing blood stains. Laboratory testing revealed no blood on the pyjamas, whereas the chemical examiner reported the presence of blood stains on the shirt.
In the investigation, a blood‑stained shirt belonging to the accused was recovered, and the laboratory serologist was unable to determine the source of the blood on that garment. The police also failed to locate the dead bodies of the victims, Kamla and Madhusudhan, and were unable to recover the jeep that was alleged to have been used in the crime. The accused Raghav surrendered before the magistrate in Barabanki on 20 April 1961. Mohan was taken into custody on 9 April, Ramanuj Das appeared before the judicial officer in Bidhuna on 24 April 1961, and Jai Devi applied for bail on 27 April, apparently surrendering on that same day. After completing their inquiries, the authorities placed all of the accused on trial. Each of the accused denied any participation in the alleged offences and asserted that they had been falsely implicated. The prosecution had no direct evidence linking Raghav to the murder of Kamla and Madhusudhan, nor any direct proof that he had moved their bodies in the jeep on the night of the incident in the village of Hamirpur Roora. Likewise, there was no direct evidence that Ramanuj Das or any other accused had taken part in the removal of the bodies from the house. Consequently, the entire case rested on circumstantial evidence. The Court noted the series of circumstances that the learned Sessions Judge and the High Court had accepted as established and from which they had inferred that Raghav had murdered the two victims and that subsequently Raghav, together with Mohan and Udham Singh, and with the assistance of Ramanuj Das and Jai Devi, had transferred the bodies in the jeep and disposed of them. The circumstances listed were as follows: first, on 5 April 1961, Kamla and Madhusudhan were present in the house of Ramanuj Das; second, they were last seen alive that evening; third, on the same day Raghav Prapanna was also present in the house; fourth, at about five or six p.m., three gunshots were heard on the roof of the house; fifth, at about nine or ten p.m., Raghav, Mohan and Udham Singh departed from the village of Hamirpur Roora in Raghav’s jeep; sixth, at about eleven p.m., Raghav purchased petrol from the Bidhuna petrol pump; and seventh, on the following morning, at about eight‑thirty a.m. on 6 April 1961, Raghav crossed the Rawatpur barrier in Kanpur.
Further circumstances cited were: eighth, on 6 April 1961, Raghav received a postcard from his sister stating that Kamla had safely reached Lucknow; ninth, on 7 April 1961, investigators recovered blood‑stained earth from eleven distinct locations inside Ramanuj Das’s house; tenth, on 14 April 1961, similar blood‑stained earth was recovered from seven additional spots in the same house; eleventh, all of the accused had absconded after the alleged murders; twelfth, the blood‑stained shirt and pyjama belonging to Raghav were recovered from the premises of Snow‑White Dyers and Cleaners in Lucknow; and thirteenth, despite diligent efforts, the police were unable to locate Raghav’s jeep. On behalf of the accused, it was not disputed that the circumstances numbered one, two, and the others listed above had been established.
The Court recorded that items numbered 7, 9, 10, 1 and 13 were proved beyond doubt. The appellants argued, however, that the remaining items had not been established and that, even if those items were proved, they were not sufficient to lead to the sole inference that Raghav had murdered Kamla and Madhusudhan or that he and the other accused had taken part in disposing of the bodies. According to the evidence, Kamla and Madhusudhan were present in the house on 5 April 1961 and were not seen after the evening of that same day. The third item, concerning Raghav’s departure from Hamirpur Roora, was contested; Raghav maintained that he left the village on 4 April 1961. This statement was supported by the testimony of Sri Ram, identified as witness 3, who said he saw Raghav travelling by jeep through Samain on the night of 4 April 1961, a Tuesday. The Court observed that even assuming Raghav was in the village on 5 April, his presence in the house does not automatically place him in a position where his failure to provide information about the whereabouts of Kamla and Madhusudhan, or about what happened to them, can be interpreted as proof that he committed the murders. The Court further noted that Raghav was not the sole person in the house who could have known the facts; other individuals were also present.
The Court acknowledged that Raghav’s presence in the house combined with his lack of effort to inquire about Kamla and Madhusudhan on 6 April could be regarded as conduct that is not normally expected of a husband, even where marital relations are strained. Nonetheless, the Court held that the fourth item, which alleged three gunshots fired from the roof of Ramanuj Das’s house at about five or six p.m. on 5 April, does not, on its own, justify a conclusion or even a reasonable suspicion that Raghav fired those shots, that the shots were discharged inside a room, or that the alleged gunfire resulted in the death of his wife and son. The Court found the link between the alleged firing from the roof and the murders to be too remote to support a finding that Raghav caused the deaths. In the same vein, the Court examined items 9 and 10 concerning the recovery of blood‑stained earth from the house and noted that the prosecution had not proved that the earth was stained with human blood. The Court expressed the view that it would be speculative to infer from the mere presence of blood‑stained earth that the stains were of human origin or that they belonged to Kamla and Madhusudhan. Consequently, the Court concluded that those items possess no evidentiary value. The facts that Kamla and Madhusudhan have not been seen since the evening of 5 April 1961 and that blood‑like stains of unproved origin were found in the room therefore do not, in the Court’s opinion, establish that the two persons must have been murdered.
The Court noted that, however strong the suspicion may be, the mere possibility that the missing persons were murdered could not be accepted where there was no indication that they could have left the house for any other place. In this regard the Court referred to circumstance number eight. Exhibit Ka‑7 was a postcard sent by Govind Kumari, who is the sister of Raghav, to Ramanuj Das on 6 April 1961 from Lucknow. The postcard stated that Raghav and others had arrived safely and that, because the “bhabi” had also arrived, it was not necessary for her to prepare food. According to the post‑mark, the postcard reached Samrin Post Office on 10 April, remained undelivered until 13 April because the addressee was absent, and was eventually handed over to the Deputy Superintendent of Police in compliance with the magistrate’s order under section 95 of the Criminal Procedure Code. An allegation was made that the postcard had been written at Raghav’s instigation to create evidence that Kamla had reached Lucknow on 6 April. The Court found that there was no evidence on record showing that Raghav had any role in the sending of the card by Govind Kumari. Moreover, Govind Kumari was not examined to verify the content of her communication or to clarify to whom the term “bhabi” referred. Raghav had asserted that he had traveled to Lucknow together with Rama Sewak’s wife, whom he also called “bhabi”. Whether that statement was true could not be established. The essential fact remained that no proof existed that Govind Kumari had composed the postcard under Raghav’s direction, and therefore the evidential value of the postcard was nil. The Court held that conclusions that Raghav caused the postcard to be sent were unwarranted in the absence of any such evidence, and there was no definitive proof that the expression “bhabi” denoted Kamla. The lower court had inferred that the omission of any wishes from Govind Kumari to Kamla and Madhusudhan in the postcard suggested that she knew they were in Hamirpur‑Roora and therefore would have conveyed her wishes if she had known of their presence. While such an expectation might be reasonable, the statement of Lakhan Prasad, PW‑6, indicated that relations between Govind Kumari and Kamla were strained. Lakhan Prasad testified that when he asked Kamla why she had been unhappy for four years, she explained that Sub‑Inspector Iqbal had visited her father‑in‑law’s house and had an illicit relationship with Govind Kumari, and that those individuals, together with Raghav, used to consume wine and meat in the temple. She further said that her complaint to her mother‑in‑law on this matter had been ignored. Consequently, the Court concluded that the lack of customary courtesies in the postcard could not be taken as evidence that it was intended to demonstrate that Kamla and her son had reached Lucknow and were alive on 6 April 1961. Accordingly, circumstances five and six, taken alone, were insufficient to support a finding that Raghav had taken the corpses of Kamla and Madhusudhan in a jeep on the night of 5 April 1961.
The Court observed that the evidence did not support the inference that Raghav had loaded the bodies of Kamla and Madhusudhan into his jeep on the night of 5 April 1961. No witness had testified to seeing any such items inside the vehicle, and therefore the proposition that the jeep contained the dead bodies could not be drawn from the record. Regarding the seventh circumstance, the Court noted that it did not cast any doubt on Raghav’s version of events because he had himself acknowledged travelling from the village of Bhuwain to Lucknow on 6 April 1961, a journey that would have required him to pass the Rawatpur barrier. This fact, the Court held, actually reinforced Raghav’s own account and did not contain any incriminating implication. Turning to the eleventh circumstance, the Court corrected the statement that all the accused had fled after the alleged murders. According to the testimony of Khushali, the village watchman who lodged the initial information report, the accused Ramanuj Das remained in the village until the morning of 7 April. The Court accepted that if Ramanuj Das and the others left the house after learning of the report, such a departure could be understood, but it emphasized that mere absconding, while possibly lending support to other incriminating material, was not, by itself, sufficient proof of guilt.
The twelfth circumstance concerned the allegation that Raghav’s shirt was discovered to be stained with blood by the chemical examiner. The Court found that the prosecution had failed to demonstrate that the stain was of human origin, and consequently the shirt could not be linked to the alleged murders. Moreover, the shirt had been taken to a dry‑cleaning establishment on 9 April and was recovered from that establishment on 16 April, although the murder was said to have occurred on 5 April. The Court therefore concluded that the stain could have arisen from causes unrelated to any participation by Raghav in the killing of his wife and son. In support of this view, the Court referred to the testimony of Babu Lal, the proprietor of Snowhite Cleaners & Dyers, who stated that when Raghav handed the shirt to him for washing it was not stained with blood, and that even when the Sub‑Inspector seized the garment it showed no bloodstain. Although the High Court had deemed Babu Lal’s statement untrue on the ground that he had signed a recovery list describing the garment as having stains suspected to be washed bloodstains, the Court noted that the list contained no explicit assertion that the shirt bore bloodstains on the date it was delivered for cleaning. Even assuming that Babu Lal’s signature on the recovery list amounted to a statement about its contents, the Court held that such a statement would be inadmissible under section 162 of the Criminal Procedure Code.
Finally, the Court examined the last circumstance, namely the failure of the police to locate Raghav’s jeep despite diligent efforts. The Court held that the inability to recover the vehicle did not, in itself, prove that the jeep, if eventually found, would have contained human bloodstains or any other evidence indicating its use in disposing of bodies. The Court stressed that drawing a conclusion that the jeep must have harboured such evidence solely from its non‑recovery was unwarranted. Consequently, the Court concluded that this circumstance possessed no evidentiary value in establishing the guilt of the accused.
The Court observed that the absence of the accused’s jeep meant that no physical examination could be made to determine whether human bloodstains were present on it. The Court explained that if the vehicle had been recovered and bloodstains had been found, that fact could have served as evidence that the jeep had been used to remove dead bodies. However, the Court held that it was unreasonable to infer that, simply because the jeep was not recovered, it would inevitably have contained bloodstains or would have proven the removal of evidence of murder. Consequently, the Court said that this circumstance possessed no evidentiary value. In addition, the Court noted the unusual conduct of the magistrate who forwarded a letter of request, issued under Section 94 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, to the jailer. The letter required the accused, Raghav, to provide information about the jeep he had left in the charge of the court at Bar‑banki and to disclose its whereabouts at the time. The Court stated that the investigating officer could have interrogated the accused in jail, as is the usual practice, provided the magistrate gave permission. By contrast, seeking written replies from the accused was described as unusual and not warranted by the provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Moreover, any answer given by the accused to such a written query could not be admitted as evidence because Section 162 of the Code of Criminal Procedure renders such statements inadmissible.
The Court further held that the circumstantial evidence relied upon by the lower courts was insufficient to sustain a finding that Raghav had murdered Kamla and their son Madhusudhan. The Court examined the alleged motive presented by the prosecution and found it wanting. The record showed that Raghav married Bimla in 1954 and apparently continued marital relations with Kamla for about seven years. Madhusudhan was born in 1957, and the evidence suggested that after Raghav’s marriage to Bimla his affection for Kamla might have lessened, possibly leading to some estrangement. Nonetheless, the Court concluded that such a circumstance did not establish a motive for killing Kamla or their son. The prosecution’s suggestion that Ramanuj Das had proposed giving Rs 10,000 and transferring ninety bighas of land to Kamla, even if true, did not demonstrate that Raghav felt a resentment strong enough to provoke murder. The Court found no record indicating how the proposed transfer of cash and property would affect the total property of Ramanuj Das or how it would ultimately impact Raghav. The Court noted that Raghav, as a lay person, had no claim to the property that would pass to the successor of Ramanuj Das as mahant of the mutt or temple. Consequently, the alleged financial motive was deemed insufficient to support the conclusion that Raghav committed the killings.
The Court noted that the mere fact that the accused departed from the location at the moment when Ramanuj Das was approached by Lakhan Das with a proposal to convey cash and land to Kamla could not be taken as conclusive proof that his departure was motivated by resentment of that proposal. The Court found no record of any protest raised by the accused at that time, nor any statement or gesture indicating that Ramanuj Das should refrain from effecting the transfer. Consequently, the Court held that it would be unreasonable to infer, solely from his leaving the place, that he harboured a deep animus sufficient to drive him to murder his wife and son. Moreover, the Court observed that there was no circumstantial evidence linking the appellants to the removal and concealment of the dead bodies. The absence of any proof that the bodies were carried in the jeep on the night in question had already been highlighted, and no evidence was presented concerning any role played by Ramanuj Das or Jai Devi in such removal. Merely being present in the house and possibly aware of the bodies’ disappearance, the Court said, did not by itself establish that they assisted in the act. Accordingly, the Court concluded that none of the appellants could be said to have committed an offence punishable under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code.
The Court further held that no offence under section 176 of the Indian Penal Code could be proved against Ramanuj Das because the prosecution had failed to demonstrate that Kamla and Madhusudhan had been murdered. As a member of the village Panchayat, Ramanuj Das was under a statutory duty to inform the nearest magistrate or the officer‑in‑charge of the nearest police station of any commission of an offence punishable under section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, but only when a murder had actually occurred and he had knowledge of it. Since such factual foundation was lacking, the Court found that the convictions of the appellants for the various offences were not supported by the material on record. In light of these findings, the Court allowed the appeal, set aside the convictions, and acquitted the appellants of all charges. The Court directed that the appellants be released forthwith from custody, unless they were required to be detained under some other legal process. In the concluding remarks, Justice Kapur recorded that the appeal concerned the judgment of the Allahabad High Court which had affirmed the conviction of Raghav Prapanna Tripathi for the murder of his wife Kamla and son Madhusudhan on the evening of 5 April 1961 at Hamirpur Roora, sentencing him to death, and had also convicted him and the other appellants under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code for causing the disappearance of evidence, imposing five years of rigorous imprisonment, while Ramanuj Das had been convicted under section 176 and sentenced to three months’ rigorous imprisonment. The Court referred to the principles laid down in Anant Chintaman Lagu v. The State, of Bombay, observing that the present case was based on circumstantial evidence, and that the established legal standards required a totality of proved circumstances that could not be reconciled with innocence.
The Court referred to the observations of Baron Parke in Towell’s case, where the learned Baron set out the principles that apply when a circumstance defeats the presumption of innocence. He explained that if such a circumstance is properly proved, it may be taken into account to determine whether the facts point only to guilt and no other inference is possible. Accordingly, the Court stated that the enquiry must consider the whole set of circumstances that have been established against the appellants and decide whether those facts are inconsistent with any claim of innocence and cannot be explained on any hypothesis other than guilt. The decision also cited the judgment of Govind Reddy, State of Mysore, for additional support. The Court observed that normally it does not revisit the evidence or re‑examine the findings of the lower courts where there are concurrent factual findings. However, counsel urged that this case fell within the exception articulated by the Privy Council in Stephen Seneviratne v. the King, which holds that, when the evidence is considered as a whole, no tribunal can legitimately infer guilt if the totality of the material does not compel that conclusion. The Court noted that the inference of guilt against the appellants was drawn from several circumstances which, in the appellants’ view, do not lead inexorably to a finding of guilt, whereas the respondent argued that the same facts lead to a single, unambiguous conclusion of guilt and proper conviction. To determine whether the conviction was properly based, the Court found it necessary to examine the evidence in detail. The cited authorities included (1) (1854) 2 S.C.R. 309, (2) A.I.R. 1960 S.C. 29, and (3) A.I.R. 1931 P.C. 289, 299.
In the village of Hamirpur Roora, located in the Etawah district, there existed a religious institution headed by Mahant Lachhman Das. Mahant Lachhman Das had two disciples: the elder, Narain Das, and the younger, Ramanuj Das, who is one of the present appellants. Narain Das married and consequently was excluded from succession. His wife, Jai Devi, is also an appellant. The couple has several children, among them a son named Raghav, who is another appellant in this matter, as well as younger sons and daughters. Only one of the daughters, Govind Kumari, a M.A., LL.B. graduate of Lucknow University, is mentioned; she is neither a witness nor an accused in this case. The other two accused persons are Mohan Singh and Udham Singh, who serve as retainers of the Mahant. Raghav, in the year 1950, was married to Kamla, the daughter of a well‑to‑do gentleman named Rain Sarup, who lived in another village. In 1954, Raghav entered into a second marriage with a woman who also held M.A. and LL.B. degrees. The second wife, together with Raghav, Govind Kumari and other sisters, were residing in a flat in Lucknow in
The prosecution alleged that after Raghav’s marriage, his relationship with his first wife Kamla had become strained and that Kamla was ill‑treated by him, which forced her to leave her father‑in‑law’s house and take refuge with her own father in his village. While Kamla was staying with her father, she and Raghav had a son named Madhusudan, who was born in 1957. During this period, Lakhan Prasad intervened and suggested that Ramanuj Das, the appellant, should give Kamla a cash amount of ten thousand rupees together with ninety bighas of land; Ramanuj agreed to the proposal. Acting on this assurance, Ramanuj went to Kamla’s father’s house, brought Kamla back after the Bidai ceremony, and returned her to the residence. The evidence of Ram Sarup, which the High Court accepted, recorded that Ramanuj himself had told Ram Sarup that the money and land would be provided. In February 1961, about a month and a half before the alleged incident, Ram Sarup visited Ramanuj’s house accompanied by Lakhan Prasad and requested Ramanuj to execute the necessary document concerning the property and the cash. Ramanuj replied that the execution would be done after Raghav returned from Lucknow. Following this discussion, Ramanuj, Ram Sarup and Lakhan Prasad met Kamla at Ramanuj’s house and informed her of the arrangement. On 4 April 1961 Lakhan Prasad learned that Raghav was about to arrive, and on the next day, 5 April 1961, he went to Ramanuj as instructed by Ram Sarup and found both Ramanuj and Raghav present. Lakhan Prasad then pressed Ramanuj to fulfill the promise of ten thousand rupees and ninety bighas of land. At that moment Raghav rose abruptly and left the place, but Ramanuj promised to execute the document on the day Ram Sarup could appear. Lakhan Prasad told Ramanuj that he would go to Ram Sarup on Saturday, 8 April 1961, bring him back on Sunday, 9 April 1961, and that the document could be executed on Monday, 10 April 1961. Ramanuj accepted this schedule, and Lakhan Prasad subsequently informed Kamla of the agreed plan. According to the prosecution, both Kamla and her son Madhusudan were shot dead in the evening of 5 April 1961, the same day the above conversation took place, and three witnesses heard the gunshots. The same evening Raghav left Hamirpur Roora by jeep, accompanied by the appellants Mohan Singh and Udham Singh. They were observed passing through the village of Samain at about nine o’clock by witness Sri Ram, after which they proceeded to Bidhupa where they purchased petrol from the shop of witness Rain Bhajan at approximately eleven p.m.
Ram Bhajan observed that two additional persons were present in the jeep that was being driven by Raghav. The vehicle subsequently crossed the River Ganga at the Rawatpur Barrier in Kanpur at approximately eight‑thirty in the morning. After crossing the river the occupants continued their journey toward Lucknow. On the following day, 6 April 1961, a post‑card was dispatched from Lucknow by an individual named Govind Kumari. The post‑card referred to the arrival of Raghav and the other persons who had travelled together in the same jeep.
The prosecution did not contest the allegation that Kamla and Madhusudan were not observed alive after the evening of 5 April 1961. In fact, it was expressly admitted that Kamla became “traceless” after Raghav departed from Hamirpur‑Roora. The same statement of disappearance applied to her minor son, Madhusudan, who was also not seen alive after that night.
On 7 April 1961, the village watchman known as Khushali Chowkidar filed a First Information Report at the local police station. The report was recorded as follows: “Day before yesterday in the night Raghav of my village, who is son of Narain Das, has murdered his wedded wife and son by firing of them with the gun of Mahant Ramanuj Das. He has gone some where with the two dead bodies in a car. There is a rumour about it in the whole of the village. Having heard of it, I went to the Mahant who is also the Pradhan of my village. I asked him to give me something in writing, so that I should go to the Police Station and make a report. The Mahant then asked me to wait and to go only after Thakur Dalganjan Singh had come. I did not listen to him, although he kept on forbidding. I have come to make a report.”
The Sub‑Inspector in charge of the police station was engaged in official duties at the time the FIR was lodged, and consequently the information was transmitted to him by other police personnel. He arrived at Hamirpur‑Roora at about two o’clock in the afternoon and proceeded to examine the residence where the deceased had been living. According to his statement, no person was found inside the house at the time of his arrival. He escorted several witnesses and conducted a systematic search of the premises. During the search he discovered patches that appeared to be bloodstains on the terrace and within the rooms on the first floor. He prepared a site plan of the house and drafted a memorandum describing his observations. Both the site plan and the memorandum have been admitted into evidence. He also collected plaster pieces that were stained with what appeared to be blood from two locations inside a room, placed each piece into separate packets, bundled the packets together and sealed the bundle for safekeeping.
On 12 April 1961, Police Deputy Superintendent Bashir Hussain assumed responsibility for the investigation and visited the scene of the alleged crime. He identified seven additional areas on the property that displayed marks resembling bloodstains. He collected soil samples from these locations, including specimens from water‑filled depressions known locally as “Parnalas.” These samples were placed in a sealed parcel. However, the sealed parcel containing all of the collected material was not forwarded to the Chemical Examiner until 25 May 1961. When the material was finally examined, the report indicated that out of the eleven pieces collected by the Sub‑Inspector, five were confirmed to be stained with blood. Of the seven pieces gathered by the Deputy Superintendent, only two were found to contain bloodstains.
When the sealed parcels containing the collected materials were examined by the serologist, only two of the items were confirmed to be stained with blood. Because the blood had disintegrated by the time of examination, the serologist could not determine its origin. The Sub‑Inspector then conducted a search for the accused persons. He succeeded in arresting Mohan Singh, who is identified as the appellant, on 10 April 1961, but he was unable to locate any of the other suspects at the house or elsewhere. The remaining individuals, except for Raghav, eventually surrendered before the magistrate’s court in Etawah district: Ramanuj Das on 24 April and Jai Devi on 27 April. The Sub‑Inspector also launched a search for Raghav, looking in various places in Lucknow, but he could not find either the accused or his jeep. On 20 April 1961 Raghav surrendered before the magistrate at Nawabganj in Barabanki district. In his surrender application he asserted that “Sri Mati Kamla, daughter of Ram Swarup of village Manchhana, P.S. Kotwali, District Mainpuri, who was residing in my house, has become traceless together with her minor son, and that a strong rumour has been spread by enemies of my family that she has been murdered.” He further maintained that his name was being linked to the alleged murder because of enmity. An affidavit filed by the appellant’s sister in the magistrate’s court stated that Kamla had fled from Ramanuj Das’s house after stealing ornaments. The police were never able to recover the jeep that Raghav had allegedly left at Hamirpur Roora, despite intensive efforts. During the investigation the police obtained from the laundry of Babulal P.W. in Lucknow a shirt and a pyjama belonging to Raghav. Although the police initially thought that blood marks were present on both garments, the chemical examiner detected only three minute bloodstains on the shirt, and, as with the earlier specimens, the origin of that blood could not be ascertained because it had disintegrated. The appellants were subsequently tried before the learned Sessions Judge, who convicted them as previously recorded; the High Court upheld that conviction, and the appellants obtained special leave to approach this Court. It is noteworthy that the body of Kamla, or that of her son Madhusudan, was never recovered, leaving the case without direct proof of the corpus delicti. The legal question therefore concerned whether, on the basis of the evidence discussed, a murder had been proved, whether the identity of the alleged murderer could be established, and whether the provisions of section 201 had been satisfied. Certain facts were undisputed: after being married to Kamla for approximately four years, the appellant Raghav contracted a second marriage.
His second wife was Vimla, a graduate of Lucknow University. It is not contested that in 1959 Kamla, together with her son Madhusudan, who had been born in 1957, left to stay with her parents. Her father was a relatively well‑off resident of another village. Kamla remained at her parents’ house for roughly two years and was returned to the village of Hamirpur Roora at some point in 1960. The prosecution alleges that her return was secured by a promise to give her a cash payment of ten thousand rupees and ninety bighas of land for cultivation; the defence disputes the existence of such a promise. The High Court, however, found that the promise and its fulfilment had been proved. There is also no dispute that Kamla and her son Madhusudan were alive up to the evening of 5 April 1961.
During the night of 5 April to 6 April 1961 both Kamla and her son disappeared. They were not seen at the residence of Ramanuj Das, where they had been staying along with her father‑in‑law, his family, and her husband Raghav whenever he visited the village from Lucknow. Raghav was a university student in Lucknow and owned a separate flat that served as his residence and that of his second wife Vimla and his sisters. The record shows that none of the family members, including Ramanuj Das, Jai Devi, or any other relative, made any effort to ascertain the whereabouts of Kamla and her son after they vanished. No police report was filed, and no search was undertaken. Later, when the village watchman of Khushali P. W. asked Ramanuj Das to provide a written statement so that he could inform the police about the rumor circulating in the village regarding a possible murder of Kamla and her son, Ramanuj Das instructed the watchman to wait until Dalgajan Singh arrived. Subsequently, the watchman filed a report at the police station.
The primary issue before the Court was whether Kamla and her son had been murdered and, if so, whether the alleged murder had taken place in the house of Ramanuj Das as asserted by the prosecution. As previously noted, Kamla and her son were observed alive on the evening of 5 April 1961 and were not seen thereafter. Both the trial court and the High Court have recorded evidence that the relationship between Kamla and her husband Raghav was strained, a circumstance that led her to leave for her parents’ home. Kamla’s father, Ram Swarup, testified to this effect, and Lakhan Prasad also testified that whenever he met Kamla, she appeared unhappy. In families such as that of the appellant, it is not common for a daughter‑in‑law to return to her parents’ house without a substantial reason. The High Court examined this evidence concerning the marital relationship in great detail, and the present discussion does not need to repeat those findings.
The Court considered the statements of the witnesses that had been referred to in the judgment of the High Court. It is satisfied that, based on this evidence, the High Court correctly concluded that the marital relationship between the parties was unhappy. Given this background, the Court needed to examine how and why Kamla returned to her in‑laws’ residence together with her son. The material relevant to that enquiry was again provided by the testimonies of Ram Swarup and Lakhan Prasad. According to Lakhan Prasad, sometime in 1960 he approached Ram Swarup and suggested that Kamla should be sent to Hamirpur Roora to avoid further trouble. He further reported that Ram Swarup was told Ramanuj Das intended to give Kamla a cash advance of Rs 10,000 together with ninety bighas of land for cultivation. The payment and land were to be provided on the condition that Kamla would take up residence at Hamirpur Roora. In accordance with that understanding, Ramanuj Das proceeded to take Kamla with him after the bidai ceremony and related rituals. At that time, Ram Swarup recalled that Ramanuj Das assured him he would settle both the cash amount and the land as previously promised. The testimony of Ram Swarup corroborated Lakhan Prasad’s account, establishing a consistent narrative regarding the proposed settlement and Kamla’s temporary relocation. Thus, the combined testimonies established a clear link between the proposed settlement and Kamla’s temporary relocation to her parents’ village.
In February 1961, Ram Swarup, accompanied by Lakhan Prasad, visited the house of Ramanuj Das to request performance of the promised settlement. Ramanuj Das replied that the settlement would be effected only after Raghav returned from Lucknow and that the necessary documents would be prepared at that time. On the morning of 5 April 1961, the date on which the alleged murder occurred, Lakhan Prasad again went to Ramanuj Das’s residence. During that visit, Lakhan Prasad engaged in conversation with Ramanuj Das while Raghav was seated nearby and appeared attentive. When Lakhan Prasad raised the subject of the promised settlement, Raghav rose abruptly and left the premises immediately. Ramanuj Das then assured Lakhan Prasad that he would execute the necessary document on Monday, 10 April 1961, as previously promised. It was also arranged that Ram Swarup would be present at the settlement to witness the execution of the document. Lakhan Prasad later informed Kamla of this scheduled settlement and the anticipated presence of the witnesses who would verify the transaction. The defence rejected this portion of the prosecution case and challenged the credibility of Lakhan Prasad’s testimony through cross‑examination. The learned Sessions Judge gave severe credence to the criticism of Lakhan Prasad, principally because a postcard produced by Ramanuj Das was introduced. That postcard, as established by defence witnesses, demonstrated that the marriage between Kamla and Raghav had been arranged by Dafadar Singh, not by Lakhan Prasad. Lakhan Prasad, however, had previously deposed that he was the one who had facilitated the marriage of Kamla and Raghav. Further, the defence argued that Lakhan Prasad could not recognize a photograph of Govind Kumari and other children, suggesting limited familiarity with the family. Nonetheless, the testimony of Lakhan Prasad received strong corroboration from the statements of Ram Swarup, which reinforced its reliability. The High Court was satisfied that, on the day in question, Ramanuj Das had agreed to execute the settlement document. The present Court finds no reason to depart from that finding and accepts that Ramanuj Das was present to finalize the monetary and land settlement in favor of Kamla.
It was shown on the record that when the question of settlement was raised in the presence of Raghav, he abruptly left the place. From this conduct the Court inferred that Raghav was dissatisfied with the settlement. On the same evening, three shots were heard by three independent witnesses: P. W. Narain Singh, P. W. Lallu Singh and P. W. Babu Singh. Both the trial court and the appellate court accepted the testimony of these three witnesses. The Court examined their statements and, although certain aspects of their testimony could be subjected to legitimate criticism, those aspects were not sufficient to undermine the core fact that the witnesses heard three distinct gunshots. The defence advanced the theory that the sound heard by the witnesses was produced by a toy gun fired by Raghav’s younger brother. The High Court rejected this theory, and the Court agrees that the defence argument lacks merit.
The next issue was whether Raghav was present in the village on 5 April, the date on which the murder occurred. The defence maintained that Raghav had departed on 4 April and therefore could not have been in the village on the day of the crime. The Court considered several pieces of evidence that counter this claim. Lakhan Prasad testified that, in Raghav’s presence, the matter of land and money settlement was discussed, after which Raghav rose and left the scene, and that this incident took place on 5 April. Additional evidence placed Raghav’s jeep at the house of Ramanuj Das on the evening of 5 April. P. W. Narain Singh reported seeing the jeep inside the house, while P. W. Lallu Singh observed the same jeep moving northwards at approximately nine or ten o’clock on the evening of 5 April 1961. P. W. Babu Singh further testified that he heard the sound of a car at about ten p.m. on that evening and stated that Raghav was the only person known to possess a jeep or a car. The Court found these witnesses credible and gave weight to their testimonies. Moreover, P. W. Sri Ram testified that at around ten p.m. on 5 April he saw Raghav’s jeep in the village of Samain, about one mile from the scene, with Raghav accompanied by the two co‑accused, Mohan Singh and Udham Singh, and that the rear curtain of the jeep was drawn. Although Sri Ram’s evidence was challenged on the grounds that he may have mistaken the date as the 4th and that he might have sighted the jeep at a different location, the Court noted that his statement was corroborated by other sources, supporting the conclusion that the jeep was indeed observed on 5 April.
In this case, the Court observed that the testimony of the witness who said he had seen the jeep on the canal bank was said to be consistent with the defence version. The Court found that the witness identified as Sri Ram had erred about the date on which he saw the vehicle. He gave his statement after a long lapse of time, but another source corroborated his account and indicated that the correct date of his observation was the 5th of April and not the 4th as he had originally stated. Two independent witnesses also reported seeing the jeep at Hamirpur Roora on the 5th of April. In addition, the person identified as Lakhan Prasad reported that he saw Raghav at the house on the same day, and further investigation traced Raghav’s subsequent movements. The record also shows that Raghav obtained petrol from the witness Ram Bhajjan. Ram Bhajjan stated that the petrol was purchased at about 10 p.m. to 11 p.m., and, taking into account the distance between Bidhauna and Samain, the Court reasoned that this timing corresponded to the period when Raghav would have been in Bidhauna. The defence criticized Ram Bhajjan’s evidence, alleging that he had confused the time of purchase and that the petrol had actually been bought at 2 p.m. rather than at night. The defence further argued that the cash memos relating to the transaction had not been produced, and that, if they had been, they might have shown that the purchase occurred earlier in the afternoon. In response, the witness explained that he remembered the time of the sale because, two days after the event, he heard a rumour concerning the case and then recalled the exact time and date on which Raghav had bought petrol from him. The defence also faulted the witness for not recalling the time of a purported purchase on the 4th of April, but the Court noted that there was no reason for him to remember a visit that, according to the evidence, did not take place. After considering these submissions, the Court concluded that the testimony of Ram Bhajjan had been properly accepted by the lower courts.
The Court further noted that on the morning of 6 April the jeep was sighted at the barrier on the banks of the River Ganga at Kanpur at approximately 8:30 a.m., after which Raghav proceeded to Lucknow. The evidence regarding the demand made by Lakhan Prasad for the settlement of land belonging to Kamla on 5 April 1961, which was made in the presence of Raghav, together with the observations that Raghav’s jeep had been seen in the village in the evening, that the same vehicle had been observed travelling from Hamirpur Roora and later at Samain and Bidhauna, enabled the Court to draw a correct inference that the appellant Raghav was present in the village of Hamirpur Roora on 5 April. Consequently, the appellant’s claim that he had left that village on 4 April was held to be false. The Court recorded that the police had been alerted on 7 April about a rumour concerning the murder of Kamla and her son in the village. In response, Sub‑Inspector Brijraj Singh Tomar arrived at the residence of Ramanuj Das at about 2 p.m. He entered the house, inspected the scene of the alleged occurrence, and prepared a site plan and a memorandum describing what he observed. The Sub‑Inspector affirmed under oath that his observations were correct, and the Court found no reason to doubt his testimony. According to his statement, he found what
The investigating officer observed material that appeared to be blood stains in several locations within the rooms and removed the plaster from those areas. Although the origin of the blood could not be established because the stains had disintegrated, the presence of blood in the rooms was an undisputed fact. The appellant, Raghav, asserted that he had departed from his village on 4 April and travelled to his maternal grandfather’s residence at Shah Nagla. He claimed that he was accompanied by his elder brother, Ram Sewak, together with Ram Sewak’s wife, whom he referred to as “Bhabhi.” According to his statement, the party left Shah Nagla on 5 April 1961 at approximately twelve noon, obtained petrol at Bidhuna, and proceeded to Samain—identified by the appellant as Bhawain—where his mother’s sister was married. He alleged that he went there to offer condolences because his mother’s sister’s father‑in‑law had died. After completing that visit, he said he travelled to Lucknow on 6 April 1961 after taking refreshments. The appellant maintained that these events could be easily proved, yet neither the elder brother nor the wife were examined as witnesses.
The only persons who testified that they saw the appellant travelling in the jeep were PW Sri Ram and PW Ram Bhajan. The lower courts had accepted their testimony, and the present Court agreed with that assessment. Neither witness reported seeing a woman in the jeep. If the appellant had indeed departed with Mohan Singh and Udham Singh, the jeep would have contained, besides the appellant, four additional occupants at the petrol station. Such a scenario was not reflected in the testimony of PW Ram Bhajan, nor was there any evidence that the father‑in‑law of the appellant’s mother’s sister (identified as Massi) had actually died, nor that the appellant had travelled to that location for condolence purposes. Consequently, the Court could not accept the appellant’s explanation in light of the witness statements previously discussed. After three gunshots were fired and heard by three witnesses, the appellant’s jeep was observed leaving the village. The vehicle was subsequently sighted in Samain with Mohan Singh and Udham Singh, and later it was seen at Bidhuna with “two persons sitting at the back.” These observations occurred on 5 April, and the Court concluded that the appellant’s version of events was false. When the appellant reached Lucknow, his sister wrote a letter stating that the appellant had arrived, that Bhabhi had also come, and that “as Bhabhi has come over here I do not have to worry about cooking food.” The defence submitted that the term “Bhabhi” might refer to Vimla or possibly the elder brother’s wife, and argued that there was no ulterior motive in the postcard to suggest that Kamla was alive on 6 April 1951. The prosecution correctly emphasized that the postcard contained no mention of Kamla, and the father’s name was likewise absent.
The judgment observed that the post‑card mentioned the appellant’s uncle, his mother and three younger children, but it made no reference to Kamla or Madbusudan. Counsel for the appellant responded that there was little affection between Kamla and Govind Kumari, and therefore the latter’s name was omitted. The counsel further argued that there was no reason to mention the little boy who could have been listed among the other children. Even if Govind Kumari’s dislike for Kamla were true, the counsel acknowledged that this would indicate that Kamla was not a welcomed member of her in‑laws’ family. The record then showed that the appellant was found to be absconding. According to the report of Sub‑Inspector Tomar, searches were conducted in various places where the appellant might ordinarily have been present in Lucknow or elsewhere, but he could not be located. Ultimately, on 20 April 1961 the appellant proceeded to Nawabganj in the district of Barabanki and surrendered before a magistrate. In the surrender application, the appellant reiterated that Kamla, daughter of Ram Swarup and residing in his house, was missing; he asserted that his enemies were alleging her murder and that his name had been implicated because of enmity, resulting in a warrant being issued against him, although he claimed to be completely unaware of her disappearance. The court noted that such conduct was extraordinary on the part of a husband. No evidence was found indicating that the husband had made any attempt to search for the missing wife or child, nor any action taken by him in regard to that matter. While he might not have been concerned for the mother, the court questioned what regard, if any, was shown to the child. The prosecution’s allegation that the appellant was absconding and could not be found despite thorough searches was considered satisfactorily established by the record.
The judgment further explained that the burden of proving the case against the appellant rested entirely on the prosecution, and the appellant bore no obligation to disprove any allegation. In a case founded on circumstantial evidence, the court must consider the cumulative effect of all proved circumstances, assemble the proven facts, draw any reasonable conclusions, and, in the absence of any explanatory evidence from the accused, rely solely on the prosecution’s evidence. An additional material circumstance concerned a shirt belonging to the appellant that was recovered from a laundry on 16 April 1961. The shirt was found to be stained with blood, although the prosecution had not established the source of the blood. The record showed that the same shirt, which the appellant had handed over to the laundry on 9 April 1961, was discovered to be blood‑stained at three separate locations. Counsel for the appellant argued that this was a harmless fact because there was no proof that the shirt bore blood on 9 April when it was given for laundering, and that the presence of only three specks of blood on 16 April, seven days later, did not constitute a significant circumstance against the appellant. The court, however, rejected this argument, noting that the presence of bloodstains, even if minimal, required consideration in assessing the cumulative circumstantial evidence.
These facts may be taken against the appellant. The Court does not agree with the view that the appellant was fortunate that the shirt had been washed, because otherwise the evidence might have either cleared him or further implicated him. The observation that the blood was not visible to Babulal when the shirt was taken does not undermine the prosecution case, as medical jurisprudence texts explain that bloodstains can be faint and invisible under ordinary illumination. The shirt had been handed over for laundering, and Babulal’s duty was to inspect for tears or damage, not to search for stains or dirt, which were the purpose of the cleaning. The shirt was khaki in colour, making small stains likely to go unnoticed. Moreover, the shirt had been submitted for washing. It is a matter of record that bloodstains were discovered on the shirt on 16 April 1961, and no proof exists that the stains were present on 9 April 1961. Nevertheless, the Court finds no plausible explanation for blood to appear on the shirt seven days after it was handed over. When the appellant was questioned about the blood‑stained shirt, he replied, “I do not know.” In view of these circumstances, the Court considered the finding to be part of the chain of circumstances that must be assembled to determine whether the prosecution case has been established against the appellant.
Another striking circumstance against the appellant is that the jeep in which Raghav travelled from his village to Lucknow has disappeared and could not be located despite diligent police efforts. It appears that the police intended to question the appellant about the whereabouts of the jeep, and an order dated 28 April 1961 directed the magistrate to require the investigating officer to issue a written notice to Raghav to produce the jeep and to interrogate him. The order also stated that the accused was at liberty to say whatever he liked and could not be compelled either to produce the vehicle or to disclose its location, as such privilege was recognised by law. Consequently, the police issued a notice calling upon Raghav to produce the jeep, which was never done and the vehicle remained unfound. The appellant’s reply could not be recorded under section 162 of the Criminal Procedure Code, and the Court has therefore excluded it from consideration. Exhaustive searches were conducted at every possible location, yet the jeep remained missing up to the present. Even when evidence concerning its disappearance was presented, no contrary evidence was offered, such as the jeep being driven to the court house and presented. The Court therefore views the non‑production of the jeep as a circumstance that may be taken into account in assessing the appellant’s guilt. The High Court had expressed the view that the jeep had not been produced because it was likely to be blood‑stained, given that dead bodies had allegedly been carried in it.
In the judgment, it was observed that the jeep alleged to have been used for transporting the dead bodies had not been produced. The court noted that, even if the vehicle were washed, traces of blood could remain concealed in joints, bolts, nuts or screws. Because the jeep had not been produced, the possibility of detecting such blood was eliminated, and the inference drawn from its disappearance could be rebutted only by arguments that the vehicle had indeed been hidden. The non‑production of the jeep was therefore regarded as a strong circumstance against the appellant, Raghav, a circumstance that the lower courts were entitled to consider. The judgment further emphasized that vehicles of this nature do not simply vanish, and when they are alleged to have been employed in disposing of bodies, their absence or inability to be located constitutes a factor that a court may weigh in determining the guilt of an accused person. It was additionally noted that the other accused persons were also absent. The court mentioned that there was no trivial reason for the entire household to flee; if the disappearance of the girl and the child had been innocent, there would have been little cause for widespread panic. The record showed that Mohan Singh was arrested on 9 April, Ramanuj Das surrendered on 24 April and, in his application, claimed to have been informed by A. P. Dubey that he was wanted. Jai Devi surrendered on 27 April 1961, claiming to be a purdah‑observing lady; her appearance in court was excused and she was released on bail. Consequently, all the accused were found to be absconding, with only one arrested while the remaining four surrendered before the magistrate, three of whom were released on bail.
The court listed several circumstances that it had taken into account. First, there were strained relations between Raghav and his wife Kamla. Second, Ramanuj Das had agreed to settle land and money in favour of Kamla, and at the urging of Ram Swarup, Kamla’s father, Ramanuj Das consented that the settlement document would be executed on Monday, 10 April 1961. Third, when the matter was discussed in the presence of the appellant Raghav, whose arrival was awaited to finalise the arrangement, he rose and departed; it was also established that Kamla had been brought from her parents’ home on the explicit condition that such a settlement would be made. Fourth, on the evening of 5 April 1961, while Raghav was in the village of Hamirpur Roora, three gunshots were heard; shortly thereafter Raghav left the scene in his jeep accompanied by two other accused, Mohan Singh and Udham Singh, and after his departure Kamla and her son were discovered missing from the house. Although this fact was uncovered the next day, no effort was made to search for Kamla and her son. The court further recorded that Raghav and his two companions travelled by night from Hamirpur Roora, appearing to be in a hurry, and were found on the morning of 6 April at Kanpur, reaching Lucknow the same day as indicated by a postcard written by Govind Kumari. The appellant’s explanation that he had left on 4 April taking his elder brother and sister‑in‑law was rejected as false. Subsequently, Raghav made himself unavailable, and the police were unable to locate him until he surrendered before a magistrate at Nawabgunj, where he filed an application stating that Kamla was missing and that he was being suspected of her murder.
The Court observed that after Kamla and her son were missing from the house, no effort was made on the following day to locate them. It was noted that appellant Raghav and his two companions had left the village of Hamirpur Roora during the night; witnesses testified that they were traveling hurriedly and were discovered on the morning of the sixth at Kanpur, and that on the same day they reached Lucknow, as evidenced by a postcard written by Govind Kumari which recorded the arrival of the appellant and others in Lucknow. The appellant explained that he had departed on the fourth, taking his father‑in‑law and his sister‑in‑law with him, but the Court found this explanation unpersuasive and deemed it false. Subsequently, the appellant disappeared and the police were unable to trace him until he surrendered before a magistrate at Nawabganj, where he filed an application stating that a person named Kamla was missing and that he was being suspected of her murder. The Court noted that it was unclear why the appellant chose to go to Nawabganj, and that neither he nor any of his relatives made any attempt to search for Kamla. When the village watchman informed Ramanuj Das of a rumor concerning Kamla’s murder, Ramanuj Das instructed him not to file a report until Dalganjan Singh, an up‑pradhan of the panchayat, arrived; the watchman finally made the report on the fourth, prompting the police to arrive the same day and inspect Ramanuj Das’s residence. The investigators discovered blood in five locations upstairs; a memo prepared and presented in court recorded that marks of blood had been wiped from many spots, and a chemical examiner identified these marks on plaster as blood, although the origin could not be determined because the samples had disintegrated. On April twelfth, Deputy Superintendent Bashir Hussain found blood in two additional places within Ramanuj Das’s house, and again the origin of this blood remained unproven due to disintegration. On April sixteenth, a blood‑stained shirt belonging to Raghav was recovered from a laundry, but no explanation for the presence of blood on the garment was offered. The Court also pointed out that on April fifth, 1961, both Kamla and her son vanished from the premises, no one heard from them thereafter, and no concerted effort was made to ascertain their fate; instead, a false narrative was presented that Kamla had left with her child, and during cross‑examination it was suggested that she had eloped with a man named Chander Sekhar, thereby disappearing from the house. The Court found no reason for her disappearance, especially since evidence showed that she was supposed to receive land and had a father capable of supporting her, and she was living in affluent circumstances.
In the facts presented, Kamla was said to be awaiting a sum of money while she was under the care of her father, who was described as being in affluent circumstances. The record also notes the disappearance of the jeep in which the appellant travelled from his village to Lucknow. A wholly false explanation was offered concerning the movements of the appellant, Raghav. Considering these circumstances, the courts below inferred that the murder had taken place at the residence of Ramanuj Das. The present Court finds no reason to disagree with those conclusions. The evidence establishes that Kamla and her son Madhusudhan are deceased and that they met violent death within the house of Ramanuj Das. The Court then referred to the headnote of King v Horry, which articulates the law that, even when neither the body nor any trace of the body has been located and the accused has made no confession, the fact of death may be proved by circumstantial evidence. Before a conviction can be sustained, the circumstances must render the commission of the crime morally certain and leave no reasonable doubt. The circumstantial evidence must be so cogent and compelling that a jury cannot conceive any rational hypothesis other than murder to explain the facts. The headnote, reported in [1952] N.Z.L.R. III, was subsequently endorsed by Regina v Onufrejczyk, except with respect to moral certainty, and this principle has also been approved by this Court in Anant Chintaman Lagu v The State of Bombay.
The Court also quoted from King v Horry, observing that a jury, after viewing the evidence in its entirety, was entitled to regard the concurrence of numerous separate facts and circumstances, each established beyond doubt, as pointing to a death occurring on or about 13 July 1942. Such concurrence excludes any reasonable hypothesis other than the death of the person alleged to have been murdered and therefore provides sufficient probative force to establish that death. In further support, the judgment in Lagu’s case, at page 506, was cited. That passage noted that in Rex v Horry [1952] N.Z.L.R. 111, the Court examined the entire English case law and observed that English law imposes no rule that the corpus delicti must be proved by direct evidence establishing both the death and its cause. Reference was made to Evans v Evans, 161 E.R. 466, 491, which held that the corpus delicti may be proved by direct evidence or by irresistible grounds of presumption. The same passage also highlighted that New Zealand courts have upheld numerous convictions where the victim’s body was never found. The two cases referred to earlier, namely King v Horry and Regina v Onufrejczyk, are therefore cases of conviction based on solely circumstantial evidence without a discovered body.
In the judgment the Court referred to the authority of conviction reported in 1955 1 Q.B. 388 and to the decision reported in 1960 12 S.C.R. 460, and also to a New Zealand case recorded in 1952 N.Z. L.R. III. The Court observed that in those authorities the convictions were secured by evidence that was wholly circumstantial, yet in each instance no body of the victim had been discovered and no trace of the body was found, nor was there any confession by the accused. The convictions were sustained because a multitude of separate facts and circumstances converged on the conclusion that death had occurred on or about a particular date, thereby excluding any reasonable hypothesis other than the victim’s death, and these facts were deemed to possess sufficient probative force to establish death. Applying the same principles to the present matter, the Court noted that the proved circumstances included strained relations between the husband and wife, a motive to avoid payment of money, land or maintenance to the wife or child, the sudden departure from the village at night together with two other persons, the almost simultaneous disappearance of Kamla and her son, the absence of any search for them, the callous conduct of Raghav, the false explanations subsequently offered by him, and his eventual absconding. From these facts the lower courts were justified in concluding that Kamla and her son had been murdered and that Raghav possessed a predominant motive to commit the murder. The High Court held that Raghav had a strong motive, considered all the circumstances, and affirmed that the Sessions Judge had rightly convicted him of murder. The Court further affirmed that although no two cases are identical, the High Court correctly applied the principles of linking the chain of events and circumstances, and properly concluded that the appellant Raghav was guilty of the offence charged. The High Court found the inculpatory facts to be inconsistent with any claim of innocence and incapable of any explanation other than the appellant’s guilt, echoing the proposition in Govinda v. State of Mysore (1960 S.C.R. 29) that when evidence is circumstantial the circumstances must be fully established, must be consistent only with the hypothesis of the accused’s guilt, must be conclusive and must exclude every alternative hypothesis, thereby forming a chain of evidence that leaves no reasonable ground for a conclusion consistent with innocence and that, within all human probabilities, the act must have been done by the accused.
The Court observed that the requirement that the fact must be inconsistent with the innocence of the accused and incapable of explanation on any hypothesis other than guilt does not permit any extravagant hypothesis; the hypothesis advanced must be reasonable. The Court noted that the evidence and the inferences drawn by the lower courts in the present case do not fall within the warning given by Baron Alderson in his charge to the jury in Re v. Hodge, where he observed that “the mind was apt to take a pleasure in adapting circumstances to one another, and even in straining them a little, if need be, to force them to form parts of one connected whole; and the more ingenious the mind of the individual the more likely was it, considering such matter, to overreach and mislead itself, to supply some little link that is wanting, to take for granted some fact consistent with its previous theories and necessary to render them complete.” (1) A.I.R. 1960 S.C. 29. (2) [1838] 2 Law 227. Consequently, the Court held that the lower courts had applied the correct principles and had found the circumstances such that they could be explained only on the hypothesis of the guilt of appellant Raghav, and therefore the finding of guilt was proper. The Court recorded that Raghav possessed an immediate motive to rid himself of his wife, that the child was similarly undesirable and could not be retained, and that the mother had been murdered. It was held that Jai Devi could not be the shooter, that Ramanuj Das had only attempted to placate Kamla by promising money and land, and that the servants had no reason to murder their mistress. The Court found it manifest that the gunshots must have been fired by Raghav, who also took steps to dispose of the bodies and the jeep that conveyed them. The Court noted that if the jeep had not been connected to the crime, its involvement would have emerged during the investigation or at trial. Accordingly, the Court dismissed Raghav’s appeal and found no reason to depart from the view of the lower courts that death was the only appropriate sentence, describing the murder as a venal act committed to eliminate an inconvenient wife and her child. The Court then considered whether an offence under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code was made out and against whom. It observed that the two appellants, Mohan Singh and Udham Singh, were in Raghav’s jeep, and if the dead bodies were removed in that jeep, as held by the lower courts, the case against these two appellants was proved. Although no one witnessed the bodies being carried, the Court held that the conclusion was drawn from a series of circumstantial events leading to guilt. The Court reiterated that the murder had been committed in the house of Ramanuj Das.
On the evening of 5 April 1961 Kamla and her child Madhusudan disappeared and, in the same short period, Raghav together with the two appellants departed in a hurried manner; the rear curtains of the jeep they used were drawn, they travelled throughout the night and required approximately eleven hours to reach the barrier at Kanpur. No trace of Kamla or her child has ever been found, and no person has seen them since their disappearance on that date. From these proved facts the courts drew the inference that an offence punishable under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code was committed, and the Court agreed that this inference was correct. Consequently, the convictions of the two appellants for that offence were upheld and their appeals were dismissed. Regarding the case of Ramanuj Das and Jai Devi, the High Court found that the bodies of Kamla and Madhusudan were not located in the house of Ramanuj Das and therefore must have been removed; it also concluded that an attempt had been made to wash the bloodstains from the interior of the rooms and from the roof, and that the removal of the bodies could not have taken place without the knowledge and active cooperation of both Ramanuj Das and Jai Devi, both of whom subsequently absconded. On that basis the High Court held the conviction of those appellants to be justified. It is a matter of record that the murder occurred in the house of Ramanuj Das and that there is evidence showing that blood inside and outside the living rooms was washed and that an attempt was made to obliterate any trace, although the attempt was unsuccessful. It may also be true that both Ramanuj Das and Jai Devi knew that the bodies had been removed, but section 201 requires that a person actually cause any evidence of the commission of the offence to disappear or that the person give information respecting the offence which the person knows or believes to be false. In the present case no evidence has been produced showing that either of the two appellants caused any evidence to disappear, nor that they supplied false information. While there exists a very strong suspicion that whoever removed the bodies from the house or washed the blood must have had the participation of the appellants, that suspicion, however strong, remains only a suspicion and does not satisfy the statutory requirements of section 201. Their mere absconding does not fill the evidentiary gap needed to prove the ingredients of the offence. Accordingly, the Court held that the case against Ramanuj Das and Jai Devi has not been made out, that their appeals must be allowed and that they should be set at liberty. The Court further found that the murder was indeed committed in the house of Ramanuj Das, that the bodies disappeared from that house, and that Ramanuj Das possessed knowledge of the commission of the murder but took no steps to inform the police.
In the matter before it, the Court examined the conviction of the appellant under section 176 of the Indian Penal Code. Considering the material placed on record, the Court concluded that the conviction under that provision was proper and therefore rejected the appellant’s challenge to that conviction. The Court then turned to the pending appeals. By a majority of the Judges, the Court allowed the appeal filed by Raghav Prapanna Tripathi together with the appeals of Mohan and Udham Singh, setting aside the orders that had been made against them. Concerning the appeal of Ramanuj Das and Jai Devi that arose out of the charge under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code, the Court found that the reasons for conviction were not sustained and, in a unanimous decision, permitted their appeals, thereby relieving them of the liability under that provision. Finally, the Court addressed the separate appeal of Ramanuj Das relating to the conviction under section 176 of the Indian Penal Code. In that part of the case, a majority of the Judges held that the conviction should be set aside, and consequently the Court allowed that appeal as well. Accordingly, the judgments of the lower tribunal were altered to reflect the acquittal of those whose appeals were allowed and the affirmation of the conviction of the appellant whose appeal was dismissed, resulting in a mixed order that applied a majority view in two instances and a unanimous view in one instance.