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Synopsis

The Supreme Court has acquitted two men of charges in a 1992 murder case after noting of the two eyewitnesses, one was declared hostile and the other one did not identify them in court.

A bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Pankaj Mithal said, "This is a case where the eye witness has not identified both the accused in the Court. In the circumstances, the appellants could not have been convicted in the absence of their identification by the eye witness before the Court."

"A witness who claims to be an eye witness must be in a position to identify the accused in the Court," the bench added.

The court set free Dharma Singh and Prakash in a case related to killing of Sarpanch Sarabjit Singh on June 23, 1992. The two were already enlarged on bail in 2012 after they had undergone incarceration of over eight years.

Court found that one eyewitness Rattan Singh did not support the prosecution case, he was declared hostile. The other eyewitness Sukhi, who was first informant, stated that he along with the deceased had gone to a place known as Chainsa. On the return journey, they got down from the bus at Mohna. The incident occurred around 8.00 to 8.30 p.m., when they were near a tubewell.

According to him, four persons emerged out of bushes. One of them abused the deceased. The first appellant fired a shot at the deceased. The appellants dragged the deceased towards the field on the left side and thereafter, fired two shots. The witness further stated that he cannot tell the name of the persons who had fired shot at the deceased.

"Assuming that eyewitness Sukhi really knew the appellants before the incident and he had seen the appellants while firing shots at the deceased, we find that he did not identify the accused who were present in the court as the accused who killed the deceased," the bench said.

In fact, the examination-in-chief of this witness showed that he has not identified the accused who were present in the court as there is no such statement in the examination-in-chief, the bench pointed out.

"Assuming that Sukhi had seen the appellants firing shots at the deceased, unless the said eyewitness identifies the accused as Dharma and Parkash, the prosecution cannot establish that the accused who were prosecuted were guilty of the offence," the bench said.

Case Title: Dharma @ Dharam Singh and Another vs. State of Haryana