Summary
Two accused challenged concurrent murder convictions arising from a shooting followed by knife assaults. The Supreme Court found the eyewitnesses reliable, their presence natural and their accounts corroborated by medical evidence. A mismatch between the recovered gun and the bullet did not defeat that evidence, since recovery of the actual weapon was not indispensable. The claim that the knife injuries were inflicted only after death lacked evidential support. The Court upheld the murder convictions and dismissed the appeal.
Issues
- Whether discrepancies and the ballistic mismatch undermined otherwise credible eyewitness evidence.
- Whether the knife-assault participant could avoid joint murder liability on the asserted timing of death.
Provisions considered
- Sections 302 and 34, Indian Penal Code, 1860Direct shooting evidence sustained the first accused's murder conviction independently of section 34, while proven participation and knife injuries sustained common-intention murder liability of the other assailants. (¶¶ 12, 13, 15)
Held
- Minor contradictions that do not affect the root of the prosecution case do not justify discarding reliable eyewitness testimony. Read as a whole, the testimony and cross-examination established both witnesses' presence and credibility. (¶¶ 9, 10)
- Recovery of the weapon used in the offence is not indispensable to conviction. The ballistic mismatch could render this gun recovery unhelpful without displacing credible shooting testimony corroborated by the gunshot injury and medical evidence. (¶ 11)
- The record did not establish that the victim was already dead when the knife blows were inflicted. Isolated answers could not displace the evidence as a whole; the assailants' participation and injuries supported their conviction with section 34. (¶¶ 12, 13)
- Prior enmity supplied a proved motive on the evidence here, and the asserted false implication was not established. The concurrent murder convictions required no interference. (¶¶ 14, 15)
Result
Appeal dismissed; murder convictions and life sentences upheld.