A criminal appeal, Dhrub Singh vs. The State of Bihar was filed in the Supreme Court on April 16, 2016 was filed against the judgment authored by Justice Anjana Prakash of Patna High Court as part of a Division Bench. It was registered on August 14, 2017. Supreme Court's Division Bench of Justices J.B. Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan heard the matter on January 23, 2025 and passed a 3-page long order. The arguments were concluded on August 21, 2026 and the order was reserved. The counsels appearing for the parties to file their respective written submissions by August 22, 2026.
In this case three appellants have prayed for bail pending the final disposal of their respective criminal appeals which are pending for final hearing before the Court. They were convicted for the offence of murder and their appeals by before the High Court also failed. Supreme Court took notice of the fact that in all eight accused were put to trial. One of the co-accused died during the pendency of the trial. The main accused who is said to have fired had already undergone the sentence of life imprisonment and was released. Out of six convicts, three were ordered to be released on bail by this Court vide orders dated August 10, 2022, December 5, 2022 and July 17, 2023 respectively. The order reads: "7. In such circumstances, referred to above, we are inclined to consider the plea of the three appellants before us for bail. 8. They have also undergone almost 9 years of sentence so far. Out of the three appellants, two of the appellants have undergone almost 9 years of sentence so far, whereas the third appellant has undergone 8 years & 5 months of sentence. 9. All the applications for bail stand allowed. 10. The appellants(convicts) are ordered to be released on bail subject to the same terms and conditions as imposed in the orders passed by this Court at the time of releasing the other co-accused on bail."
In Dhrub Singh vs. The State of Bihar (2015), Patna High Court's Division Bench of Justices Anjana Prakash and Rajendra Kumar Mishra delivered a 20-page long judgment dated December 9, 2015, wherein, it concluded:"16. As for alternative argument of considering the case of non-assailants, even while we are inclined to disbelieve the prosecution case in so far as the Appellant Chunnu Singh having ordered Appellant Pappu Singh to fire is concerned, but fact remains that all the accused variously armed had come together and fired which makes out a case of accused having common intention/object to commit murder of the deceased. In such circumstances, we find no merit in such submission. 17. For the aforesaid reasons, we find no merit in these appeals. The same is dismissed." The judgement was authored by Justice Prakash.
The appellant Pappu Singh was convicted and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for life under Section 302 I.P.C., 5 years rigorous imprisonment under Section 307/149 I.P.C., 2 years R.I. under Section 148 I.P.C. and 3 years under Section 27 of the Arms Act and also fine of Rs.3000.
The appellant Dhrub Singh and Appellant Dharmender Singh @ Tarzan Singh @ Tarzan and appellant Dharmendra Singh were convicted and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for life under Section 302/149 I.P.C., 5 years rigorous imprisonment under Section 307 I.P.C., 2 years rigorous imprisonment under Section 148 I.P.C. and 3 years rigorous imprisonmentunder Section 27 of the Arms Act with a fine of Rs.3000/. The appellant Chunnu Singh @ Subhash Chandra Singh @ Subhash Chander Singh and appellants Brajesh Singh and Subhash Singh were convicted and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for life under Section 302/149 I.P.C., 3 years rigorous imprisonment under Section 307/149 I.P.C. and one year rigorous imprisonment under Section 147 I.P.C. by judgment dated 29.11.2010 passed by the 7th Additional Sessions Judge, East Champaran, Motihari in a Sessions Trial of 2002.
The case of the prosecution according to the Informant Kundan Kumar (P.W.7), son of the deceased, was that on April 19, 2001 at about 2.30 p.m. he left home along with the deceased Braj Bhushan Singh, their Sepoy Chandeshwar Singh, co-villager Bhagirath Thakur and cousin Nilesh Kumar Sharma for their agricultural farm. When they were in the middle of Arara village and Laxmipur School at about 03.30 p.m. suddenly 7-8 persons came, who were identified as Chunnu Singh, Pappu Singh, out of which Chunnu Singh told Pappu Singh to fire at the deceased Braj Bhushan Singh and he did so on taking position from the back, on account of which his father fell down. Just then Appellant Dhrub Singh fired at him but he was somehow saved. They all started running but Brajesh Singh ordered that everyone should be killed else they would go to the police, at which Appellants Dharmendra singh @ Tarzan and Dharmendra Singh started firing but their shots did not hit them. They noticed a patrolling party approaching, at which the accused started fleeing, saying that the deceased had been killed which needed to be reported to Madan Singh that the work had been accomplished. They then took the deceased to Dunkan Hospital, Raxaul but the doctor declared him dead. The dead body of his father was brought home. The motive for the occurrence was that the daughter of Major Harendra Singh had been kidnapped on August 29, 2000 by his co-villager Ramesh Singh. The past Mukhiya Madan Mohan Singh, Dharmendra Singh son of Madan Mohan Singh, Chunnu Singh, Dharmendra Singh @ Tarzan, Subhash Singh, Sanjeet Singh, Manoj Singh, Arvind Singh, Brajesh Singh had come to his village and proposed to his father that he was a reputed person and he should try to use his influence for recovering the girl. His father had made enquiry but it was found that Ramesh Singh had fled away with the girl, on account of which the girl was not recovered. Madan Mohan Singh had felt insulted on account of the inability of the Appellant and had started instigating others that the deceased had played with the reputation of their villagers. On September 12, 2000 Adapur P.S. case was instituted in regard to the case aforesaid. His brother Sanju Dubey (P.W.5) was also sought to be implicated in the case but final report was submitted in his regard. Then in another case, namely, Adapur P.S. case of 2000, once again his name was given but final report was submitted. His cousin brother Satyendra Dubey was a candidate for Mukhiya election and there was every chance of his winning which had caused apprehension in the mind of Madan Mohan Singh, the previous Mukhiya, Arera, who had got the deceased killed. This information was given in the presence of Nilesh Kumar (P.W.2) and Hridesh Dubey (P.W.3) at 06.45 p.m. at home.
The counsel for the appellants submitted that the manner of occurrence has not been proved by the prosecution on account of various factors, one of which is that important witnesses, such as, patrolling party and the Doctor at Dunkan Hospital have not been examined. P.W.2 and P.W.7 have stated that they did not see anyone while they were walking behind each other during or after the occurrence and hence their depiction of the manner of occurrence is not proved. Further independent witnesses, even by way of hearsay, have not been examined and only interested witnesses, who are somehow related with the deceased, have been produced by the prosecution. The Investigating Officer has committed various lapses including not establishing the place of occurrence and the inquest report and the map prepared by him are contrary to each other. He also did not find any holes in the clothes which the deceased was wearing nor blood on him. He did not produce the blood stained earth nor did he seize the clothes on the person of the deceased and the witnesses, who are said to have carried the deceased to the patrolling party, nor did he send the same. In fact, neither the Informant nor P.W.1 was present at the place of occurrence as is evident from the evidence of P.W.6. Even though it is a case of direct evidence, since the prosecution has brought forth motive for the occurrence they were duty bound to conclusively prove the same. The prosecution case suffers on this count as well. The Doctor’s evidence also further disproves the prosecution case inasmuch as the injuries found on the deceased appear to have been caused while a person would be in a supine position and the time of occurrence in his opinion being about 36 hours before the examination does not match with the prosecution case. The further submission is that the deceased’s own agnates had a grudge with the deceased and there is every possibility of him having been killed by them. In the alternative, the argument is also that there is specific allegation of firing against Appellant Pappu Singh on the orders of Chunnu Singh but no overt act is alleged with regard to the rest of the accused persons and hence they deserve to be acquitted.
In her judgement, Justice Prakash had observed: "15. On looking into the records of the case, we find that soon after the occurrence a protest petition had been filed against the Investigating Officer that he was making a collusive investigation which explains as to why he did not record the statements of independent witnesses nor send the blood stained earth for chemical examination, nor seize the blood stained clothes on the person of the deceased or the witnesses. In such circumstances, the argument that the prosecution has not been able to prove the manner of occurrence or the presence of the witnesses for the aforesaid reason has to be rejected. As for the manner of occurrence, we find that the consistent evidence is that all the witnesses were walking behind each other and suddenly the accused persons sprang upon them and shot at the deceased from the back, on account of which he fell down on his face. From their evidence the fact that they did not hear any accused before the firing or even during the firing is well explained since from the manner narrated it appears that the occurrence had not taken place within minutes. In such circumstances, when Pappu Singh was not being seen before firing at the deceased from the back and the rest firing at the witnesses to scatter them off or even to kill them is well plausible. Also the fact that scratches were found on the face of the deceased further corroborates the prosecution case that after the firing from the back the deceased had fallen on his face. As for the injuries being oval or circular has no meaning in the present case since it is most natural that a person’s hand would shake and not be completely stable while firing is made within a split of second especially when the target is moving. The doctor no doubt stated in his cross examination that when he said that the occurrence had taken place within 36 hours he had meant that it could be within 24 to 36 hours, is not acceptable by the Court. Once he has stated in his examination-in-chief that it was within 36 hours it certainly means that it was within 36 hours and such minute timing of death so precisely could not be given by him especially when he has mentioned that rigor mortis was present."
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