Summary
A three-Judge Bench set aside the conviction and death sentence of the appellant for the sexual assault, murder and burning of a seven-year-old girl. It found that the trial denied him a fair defence (charges framed while he was unrepresented and without supply of documents, legal aid counsel appointed four days before evidence began, and sentence passed the same day as conviction), and, examining the merits given the eight-year lapse, held that none of the circumstances relied on (last seen, CCTV footage, disclosure-based recoveries, DNA reports) was proved.
Issues
- Whether the trial was fair where charges were framed without counsel or supply of documents under Section 207 CrPC and legal aid counsel was appointed only days before prosecution evidence began.
- Whether the death sentence, imposed on the day of conviction without any mitigation inquiry, was vitiated.
- Whether the last-seen evidence and the oral evidence about CCTV footage were reliable.
- Whether the recoveries said to follow the appellant's disclosure statement, and the reproduction of his full confession in the investigating officer's deposition, could be relied upon.
- Whether the DNA reports could be relied upon without proof of chain of custody of the samples.
Provisions considered
- Articles 21 and 22(1), Constitution of IndiaLeaving the accused unrepresented at the framing of charges in a capital case and giving appointed legal aid counsel no real time to prepare was held to breach the guarantee of an effective opportunity to defend. (¶¶ 35, 36)
- Section 207 (Section 230 BNSS), Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973Copies of relied-upon documents were supplied only after charges were framed and four days before evidence began; the Court held they must be supplied immediately on filing of the report or committal. (¶¶ 34, 35, 37)
- Sections 25 and 27, Indian Evidence Act, 1872Only the part of a custodial statement that distinctly leads to discovery is admissible; the trial court's allowing the investigating officer to narrate the entire confession contravened Section 25 and was prejudicial, and the discoveries themselves were held not to have followed from the appellant's disclosure. (¶¶ 54, 60, 61, 63)
- Section 165 (Section 168 BSA), Indian Evidence Act, 1872Cited for the duty of the trial court not to remain a mute spectator but to put necessary questions to witnesses to ensure fairness. (¶ 37)
- IPC Sections 363, 366, 354-B, 302, 201; POCSO Sections 6 r/w 5(m) and 8 r/w 7, Indian Penal Code, 1860 and Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012The convictions and sentences, including death for murder, were set aside because the circumstantial chain was not proved. (¶¶ 2, 81, 83)
Held
- An effective opportunity to defend requires: supply of all relied-upon documents immediately on filing of the police report or committal; representation by counsel of choice or by an experienced legal aid counsel, preferably of ten years' standing in capital cases; sufficient time for that counsel to prepare; and an active trial judge who puts necessary questions to witnesses. (¶¶ 36, 37)
- Framing charges against an unrepresented accused without supplying documents, appointing legal aid counsel only four days before evidence began, and completing 30 witnesses in about one and a half months denied the appellant a fair trial; prejudice was evident on the record. (¶¶ 35, 38)
- Hearing on sentence and imposing death on the very day of conviction, without reports on mitigating and aggravating circumstances, psychological evaluation or jail conduct, vitiated the sentence. Though remand would ordinarily follow, the Court examined the merits given the long lapse of time and incarceration. (¶¶ 39, 40)
- The last-seen witness did not tell the father or police of seeing the child with the appellant despite joining the search, the complaint did not mention it, and he disclosed it to the second investigating officer only months later; the circumstance was held to be a concoction. (¶¶ 44, 45, 46, 73)
- The CCTV footage was never collected or exhibited, the oral accounts about it were contradictory, and the investigating officer did not speak of it; no credence could be given to it and an adverse inference was drawn against the prosecution for withholding it. (¶¶ 47, 49, 50, 51)
- Since the police had told the father and the panch witness the details of the crime and the location of the body before the disclosure statement was recorded, the recoveries could not be attributed to the disclosure; the bag and articles were not mentioned in the mahazar, ornaments were not shown to be sealed, and no identification parade was held, so the recoveries were held to be planted or unreliable. (¶¶ 53, 54, 55, 58, 59, 60)
- Without proof that samples were sealed, kept safely and transmitted to the laboratory, and with the appellant's blood sample taken months after arrest without documentation, the chain of custody was broken and the DNA reports could not be relied upon; the semen match was in any case worthless as the recovery of the undergarment itself was unproved. (¶¶ 69, 71, 74, 76, 78, 79)
- However heinous the crime, conviction must rest on proof beyond reasonable doubt and not on moral conviction, conjecture or public sentiment; as none of the vital circumstances was proved, the conviction could not stand. (¶¶ 80, 81, 82)
Result
Appeals allowed; conviction and sentences, including the death sentence, set aside; the appellant acquitted and directed to be released forthwith if not wanted in any other case.