ASHOK, KUMAR versus THE STATE (DELHI ADMINISTRATION)

Citation: [1995] SUPP. 3 S.C.R. 777 · Decided: 19-09-1995 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: M.M. PUNCHHI, SUJATA V. MANOHAR · Disposal: Appeal(s) allowed

Judgment (excerpt)

ASHOKKUMAR 
A 
v. 
THE STATE (DELHI ADMINISTRATION) 
SEPTEMBER 19, 1995 
[MADAN MOHAN PUNCHHI AND SUJATA V. MANOHAR, JJ.] 
B 
Criminal Law : 
Indian Penal Code, 1860: 
c 
S.302-Murder-Husband killed by wife and her lover allegedly with a 
stone-Wife convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment and fine-Other 
accused convicted and sentenced to death-Confinned by High Cowt-Ap-
peal prefe"ed by the main accused but not by the co-accused-Held, the act. 
of the main accused was not so crnel, unusual or diabolical to wa"ant death 
penalty-Sentence commuted to life imprisonment. 
D 
The accused as also his co-accused Smt. P. belong to the same village 
in Rajasthan and had a long knit physical intimacy with each other. Smt. 
P. was given in marriage to M. Out of the wedlock, two children were born. 
However the passion between the accused continued and so both of them E 
drew a plan to kill M. According to the Prosecution accused, M, and his 
two children moved from their respective residence and on their way to 
Delhi, stayed in the house of PW. 33. Thereafter they reached Delhi and 
stayed in a hotel, the co-accused and her family in one room and the 
appellant in another room. At the hotel desk the appellant gave a fictitious 
name and a false address. 
F 
Both the accused and the children left Delhi. After a couple of days, 
the management of the hotel found some foul smell coming out of the room 
occupied by M. They called the Police and in their presence broke open 
the lock and found the dead body of M, some blood stains, a red stone, a G 
plastic roµe, s~me broken bangles and a tuft of hair. Post-mortem revealed 
that it was a homicidal death. 
The accused were arrested after a few days and after investigation 
sent up for trial before the Court of Session, which convicted the appellant 
for the murder of M and sentenced him to death. The co-accused was H 
77T 
778 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS (1995] SUPP. 3 S.C.R. 
A 
convicted for an offence under S.302/34 IPC and was sentenced to life 
imprisonment and to pay of a fine of Rs. 1,00,000 in default of payment 
thereof, to undergo 31/2 years' rigorous imprisonment. The High Court 
confirmed the conviction and sentence. The appellant preferred the 
present appeal, through a jail petition on which leave was granted by the 
B 
Court. The co-accused did not prefer any appeal. 
Allowing the appeal to the extent of commuting the sentence to life 
imprisonment, this Court 
HELD : 1. There is no reason to disbelieve the evidence of the 
C Prosecution witnesses. The discovery ofE group blood on the stone, clothes 
of the deceased and the clothes of the appellant removed from his person 
on his arrest on 12.1.1988 also assume significance. This is indicative of 
the appellant's close proximity to the deceased when he was fatally 
wounded. And lastly is the statement of the co-accused which fixes the 
D appellant to be in the company of the deceased at or about the time when
1 
he met his death, let alone what he said to his co-accused. Lastly ever' 
brooding to the occurrence is the motive of the crime. No animus is alleged 
against the prosecution. It has given the chain of events and the move-
ments of the accused inter se and of their being seen together in the 
company of the deceased. The appellant has thus necessarily to be held 
E 
guilty of the crime, unless he had a plausible explanation to offer. But 
instantly, the appellant gave no explanation at all - what to say of a 
plausible one. The appellant, was thus .rightly convicted of the offence 
under Section 302 IPC. The appraisal of evidence of both courts was sound 
and this Court agrees with their verdict. [783-E-G] · 
F 
2. The Trial Judge fixed his attention more on the defiance and 
unrependent attitude of the appellant as observed by him while the appel-
lant stood before him in dock as an accused. The High Court on the other 
hand was more on the moralistic aspect in the appellant having killed his 
mistress's husband for lust. Even if these two aspects are allowed to play 
G a part, all the more when there is no explanation by the appellant, still this 
is not the rarest of rare cases in which death penalty should be imposed 
on the appellant. It cannot be forgotten that two children were born to the 
co-accused. The appellant was intimate with his co-accused even prior to 
her marriage with the deceased, and kept on being so even after the birth 
H of the children. That was obviously a long durated steady connec

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