Patna High Court: A Single Judge Bench comprising of Aditya Kumar Trivedi, J. allowed a criminal appeal and set aside the conviction and sentence of the appellant under Section 307, 333 and 34 IPC along with Section 27(1) of Arms Act.
The appellant was accused of firing gunshot at the injured Assistant Sub-Inspector (informant) while he was returning from election duty. It was alleged that the appellant came on a motorcycle from behind along with the co-accused and fired gunshot at the petitioner thereby injuring him. The FIR was registered in the case, the appellant was apprehended, charge sheet filed, and he was tried, convicted and sentenced as mentioned above. The appellant challenged the order of the trial court in the instant appeal.
The High Court, on a careful consideration of the record, inter alia observed that the informant saw the appellant who came from behind, only after the gunshot had been fired. As there was no other person to be seen on the road, the informant inferred that it was the appellant who had injured him. The conviction was based on the fardbeyan of the informant, and such inference as was made by the informant could not be made a basis for conviction of the appellant. Further, identification of the appellant was done by the informant while he was in the police station in another case, and no proper test identification parade was conducted which was another irregularity which demanded consideration while deciding the case. In such circumstances, the High Court allowed the appeal and set aside the order of conviction and sentence passed against the appellant. [Santosh Yadav v. State of Bihar,2018 SCC OnLine Pat 955, dated 29.05.2018]