# SHESHANNA BHUMANNA YADAV v. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

- **Citation:** [1971] 1 S.C.R. 617
- **Court:** Supreme Court of India
- **Decided:** 1970-05-08
- **Case number:** Criminal Appeal No. 225 of 1969
- **Bench:** A. N. Ray, I. D. Dua
- **Source:** https://unisonlegal.in/judgment/supreme-court-of-india/sheshanna-bhumanna-yadav-v-state-of-maharashtra-5103
- **Pages:** 9

## Headnote

617
Indian Evidence Act (I of 1872). ss. 133, 114, ill. (b)-Evidence of
accomplice and corroboration-Scope of.
Two accused father and son were convicted of the offence of murder·
ing a young boy of 15 and the offences of house-breaking and theft next
day, of articles from the house of the grand-father of the deceased in
which the
deceased was living alone at the time of his murder.
'Dhe
evidence mainly consisted of that of the apprO\·er,
fhe corroboration
of the approver's evidence as against one of the accused (the son) con·
sisled of the following :-(i) on the day of the occurrence, two wit·
nesses saw the accused the approver and another (a young boy of 15)
wearing khakishorts and a white shirt; (2) a few days later another wit·
ness saw a dead body at the scene of the crime-a field, with khaki shorts
and a white shirt; (3) the grand-father discovered the theft and the
disappearance of his grandson when he returned to the house a week
alter the occurrence; ( 4) the approver, on the date of his arrest pointed
out to the police the scene of the crime where, among other things
a
shirt, a chain! and some bones were
found-the shirt and chain were
identified to be those of the deceased-and according io the medical
evidence the bones were those of a human being, possibly male; (5) the
accused, after his arrest, produced to the police, a pieee of cloth stolen
from the house; (6) the evidence of pledge of a cycle and sale of a
cycle carrier belonging to the granO-father of the deceased: (7) sale
of some utensils belonging to the grand-father of the deceased, by the
accused. after scrapping off the name; and (8) the finding of a cloth
belongi•lg to the grandfather of the deceased in a tailor's shop. which the
accused hastened to take away, when he learnt that the grand-father was
questioning the tailor about the cloth.
As regards the other accused (the father) the corroborating evidence
consisted of the following :- (1) there were civil and criminal pro·
ceedings between him and the grand'father of the deceased O\'er the pos·
session of the house : ( 2) he gave and sold several, articles and pieces of
silver to a witness who was traced by the police as a result of the s.tatement of the accused (sen).
The articles were produced before police.
and all of them except one lump of silver, were identified by the grandfather of the deceased as his articles; (3) it was this accused who gave
the piece of cloth to the approver who ~ave it to the, tailor and which
was hastily taken away by his son; and (4) he joined hi, son in the sale
of cycle carrier.
On the question
whether the corroboration
was sufficient in
law.
HELD: In Sarwan Singh v. State of Punjab, [1957] S.C.R, 953 and
in Lachi Ram v. State of Punjab, [1967] I S.C.R. 243, it was held that the
court should, be &atisfied : (!) that the apryrover or accomplice was a
reliable witness; (2) there must be reliable corroboration of the appro,-er's
evidence; and (3) there must be sufficient corroborative evidence
in
material particulars to connect the accused with the crime. The nature of
618
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
(1971] l S.C.R.
co~roboration is that it is confirmatory eviden_ce and may consist -of_ the
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evidence of another
witness_ or of circumstances. like conduct of the
accused.
When it is said that corroborative evidence must implicate the
accus_ed in material particulars it means that it is not enough that a piece
of evidence tends to confirm the truth of a part of the testimony to be
corroboratecl. It must confirm that part of the testimony which suggests
that the crime was committed by the accused. [622 E-F; 625 A-BJ
In the present case, apart from the relationship between the two
11accused, there was also close association in the disposal of the ~rticles.
The close proximity of time between the murder and theft points to the
inescapable conclusion that they formed part of the same transaction.
Since the transaction was one composite unit of murdering and committing
theft, and it wa

## Text

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SHESHANNA BHUMANNA YADAV
V.
STATE OF MAHARASHTRA
May 8, 1970
[A. N. RAY AND I. D. DUA, JJ.]
617
Indian Evidence Act (I of 1872). ss. 133, 114, ill. (b)-Evidence of
accomplice and corroboration-Scope of.
Two accused father and son were convicted of the offence of murder·
ing a young boy of 15 and the offences of house-breaking and theft next
day, of articles from the house of the grand-father of the deceased in
which the
deceased was living alone at the time of his murder.
'Dhe
evidence mainly consisted of that of the apprO\·er,
fhe corroboration
of the approver's evidence as against one of the accused (the son) con·
sisled of the following :-(i) on the day of the occurrence, two wit·
nesses saw the accused the approver and another (a young boy of 15)
wearing khakishorts and a white shirt; (2) a few days later another wit·
ness saw a dead body at the scene of the crime-a field, with khaki shorts
and a white shirt; (3) the grand-father discovered the theft and the
disappearance of his grandson when he returned to the house a week
alter the occurrence; ( 4) the approver, on the date of his arrest pointed
out to the police the scene of the crime where, among other things
a
shirt, a chain! and some bones were
found-the shirt and chain were
identified to be those of the deceased-and according io the medical
evidence the bones were those of a human being, possibly male; (5) the
accused, after his arrest, produced to the police, a pieee of cloth stolen
from the house; (6) the evidence of pledge of a cycle and sale of a
cycle carrier belonging to the granO-father of the deceased: (7) sale
of some utensils belonging to the grand-father of the deceased, by the
accused. after scrapping off the name; and (8) the finding of a cloth
belongi•lg to the grandfather of the deceased in a tailor's shop. which the
accused hastened to take away, when he learnt that the grand-father was
questioning the tailor about the cloth.
As regards the other accused (the father) the corroborating evidence
consisted of the following :- (1) there were civil and criminal pro·
ceedings between him and the grand'father of the deceased O\'er the pos·
session of the house : ( 2) he gave and sold several, articles and pieces of
silver to a witness who was traced by the police as a result of the s.tatement of the accused (sen).
The articles were produced before police.
and all of them except one lump of silver, were identified by the grandfather of the deceased as his articles; (3) it was this accused who gave
the piece of cloth to the approver who ~ave it to the, tailor and which
was hastily taken away by his son; and (4) he joined hi, son in the sale
of cycle carrier.
On the question
whether the corroboration
was sufficient in
law.
HELD: In Sarwan Singh v. State of Punjab, [1957] S.C.R, 953 and
in Lachi Ram v. State of Punjab, [1967] I S.C.R. 243, it was held that the
court should, be &atisfied : (!) that the apryrover or accomplice was a
reliable witness; (2) there must be reliable corroboration of the appro,-er's
evidence; and (3) there must be sufficient corroborative evidence
in
material particulars to connect the accused with the crime. The nature of
618
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
(1971] l S.C.R.
co~roboration is that it is confirmatory eviden_ce and may consist -of_ the
A
evidence of another
witness_ or of circumstances. like conduct of the
accused.
When it is said that corroborative evidence must implicate the
accus_ed in material particulars it means that it is not enough that a piece
of evidence tends to confirm the truth of a part of the testimony to be
corroboratecl. It must confirm that part of the testimony which suggests
that the crime was committed by the accused. [622 E-F; 625 A-BJ
In the present case, apart from the relationship between the two
11accused, there was also close association in the disposal of the ~rticles.
The close proximity of time between the murder and theft points to the
inescapable conclusion that they formed part of the same transaction.
Since the transaction was one composite unit of murdering and committing
theft, and it was found that the approver was a reliable witness, all the
pieces of evidence afforded
sufficient corroboration
of
the approver's
evidence in material particulars ancl proved that the accused were guilty"
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of the offences with which they were charged. [624 C-D; 625 D, El
CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Criminal Appeal No.
225 of 1969.
Appeal by special leave from the judgment and order dated
December 18, 1962 of the Bombay High Court in Criminal Appeal
No. 1426 of 1968 and confirmation Case No. 21 of 1968.
Y ogeshwar Prasad, for the appellant.
S. B. Wad and S. P. Nayar, for the respondent.
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by
Ray, J.
This appeal by special leave is against the judgment dated 18 December, 1968 of the High Court at Bombay
dismissing the appeal and confirming the convict;cn
0f
Moti
alias
Narayan Shesharina Yadav and Sheshanna Bhumanna
Yadav accused No. 2 nd 3 respectively except that the conviction of accused No. 2 of the substantive oftcn~c of
murder
under section 302 was altered and accused No. 2 was convicted
of an offence under section 302 read with section 120B as well
as of offence under section 302 read with section 34 of
the
Indian Penal Code.
The High Court confirmed the sentence of
death passed against accused No. 3 Sheshanna Bhumanna Yadav.
Accused No. 2 son of accused No. 3 was at the time of the
judgment of High Court of 17 years of age.
The Hip Court
reduced the punishment of accused No. 2 to rigorous imprisonment for life.
Accused No. 1 Hiralal was the domestic servant
of Dr. Nanavati grandfather of the deceased Narendra. Accused
No. 2 is the son of accused No. 3.
Accused No. 1 Hiralal Jamnadas Joshi, accused No. 2 Moti
alias Narayan Sheshanna Yadav and accused No. 3 Sheshanna
Bhumanna Y adav were charged with having entered into criminal conspiracy with approver Dinkar Sakharam between 19·
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SHESHANNA V. MAHARASHTRA (Ray, J.)
619·
December, 1967 and 4 Janutiry, 1968 at Deolali Camp for the.
purpose of committing the murder of Narendrakumar and committed house breaking and thefts in the house of
his
grandfather Dr. Nanavati and disposed of the property so
obtained .
and caused the evidence of murder to disappear with the intention of screening the offenders from lawful punishment and •that
these acts were done in pursuance of the said criminal conspiracy,
an offence punishable under section 120B read with
sections
302, 454, 380, 414 and 201 of the Indian Penal Code. Accused
No. 1 to 3 were further charged with having
committed
the
murder of Narendrakumar in complicity with approver Dinkar
Sakharam and the said murder came to be committed in furtlv.rance of common intention of all the accused
an offence
punishable under section 302 read with section 34 of the Indian
Penal Code. They were further charged under sections 201, 454,.
380 and 411 of the Indian Penal Code.
Dr. Dalichand Nanavati the grand-father of deceased Narendrakumar who met unnatural and unfortunate end at the hands
of accused No. 2 and one Dinkar Sakharam, subsequently turned
approver, resided at Deolali Camp· at Dhondi Road i~ bungalow No. 17 for about 11 years.
He was a registered medical
practitioner.
At the relevant time he was in
pharmaceutical
business for the manufacture of medicines.
The
head
office
was at Bombay.
The branch was at Deolali.
The owner of
bungalow No. 17 was Narsanna Bhumanna Yadav brother of
accused No. 3.
Narsanna was a person of unsound mind and
accused No. 3 was the holder of power of attorney.
Accused
No. 3 resided at the rear portion of bungalow No. 17.
The
bungalow was agreed to be sold to Dr. Nanavati.
There were
civii and criminal proceedings out of that transaction. Bungalow
Nu. 17 was eventually sold to a third party on 11 May, 1964.
In the sale deed it was said that possession of the portion in the
occupation of Dr. Nanavati would be handed over to the vendee
when the proceedings pending against Dr. Nanavati concluded.
Dr.. Nanavati succeede~ in those proceedings.
Therefore, posse'.s1on could 1not be given by the vendor to the vendee.
In the month of November, 1967 Dr. Nanavati's wife
left
Deolali for Jodhpur.
Dr. Nanavati also left Deolali and went
to l1is native place leaving his grandson Narendra, who was
about 15 years of age in the care of his domestic servant accused
No. 1.
The prosecution case was
as
follows.
Accused
No.
3
thought that Dr. Nanavati's departure from Deolali leaving his
grandson Narendra at the bungalow in charge of the domestic
servant was a ~ood opportunity to commit theft of articles in ~
house of Dr. Nanavati and to murder his grandson Nare)11lra
'620
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
[1971] l S.C.R.
with ·a view to frightening Dr. Nanavati to vacate the bungalow.
Accused No. 3 called Dinkar on 19 December, 1967 and suggested to Dinkar that the latter should commit the murder of
Narendra after 21 December, 1967 when Dr. Nanavati would
leave the bungalow and his grandson Narendra woulj be there
witn the domestic servant.
Accused No. 3 proposed a reward
to Dinkar, namely, a motor cycle and a further sum of Rs. 100
.Accused No. 3 told Dinkar that the said accused had committed
two murders prior to that date but nothing happened to him.
Dinkar at first expressed his inability to undertake
the
job.
Accused No. 3 then said that Dinkar should take accused No.
2 who was the son of accused No. 3 for the. job.
Accused No. 2 and Dinkar started
getting
familiar · and
.friendly with Narendra.
They, visited his house regularly.
They
moved about with Narendra.
On 25 December, 1967 accused
No. 1 the domestic servant of Dr. Nanavati left Deolali and
went to Bombay.
Ac~used No. 2 and the. approver Dinkar took
Narendra out with the intention of murdering him but because of
·certain interruptions they could not muster courage to achieve
that opject.
On 27 December, 1967 accused
No. 3
called
Dinkar and told him and accused No. 2 that he was going to
Nasik in connection with some court work and
they
should
murder Narendra ar.d that he would look to everything after
his return from Nasik.
Nasik is about 5 or 7 miles
from
Deolali.
·
Accused No. 2 and Dinkar took Narendra to a lonely area
beyond Barne's High School on the pretext of collecting clothes
from a washerman and w.~nt to the house of the latter -and collected a coaple of garments.
Thereafter they went to a gard.~n
where they drank water and then went to a open field. There
they plucked fresh groundnuts and started eating them. Accused
No. 2 and Dinkar took Narendra to a jowar field.
Dinkar gave
a blow with his hand on the neck of Narendra as a result of
which Nar.~ndra fell down.
Accused No. 2 and Dinkar held
Narendra tightly.
Dinkar set upon his abdomen and
started
·choking his throat with both his hands and accused No. 2 gagged his mouth and nose.
Dinkar gave blows on Narendra's
abdomen. After Narendra was choked for about 10/15 minutes,
he breathed his last.
Accused No. 2 then asked Dinkar to take out the key of the
bungalow which he had seen Narendra putting in his pocket and
Dinkar removed the key and gave it to accused No. 2. Ac;:used
No. 2 scraped some earth and dug a small pit and placed Naren-
.dra in it, face downwards, and covered it with some loose earth.
Accused No. 2 and Dinkar then returned to the house of accused
No. 3.
On being told that accused No. 2 and Dinkar had acA
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SHESHANNA V. MAHARASHTRA (Ray, J.)
complishec! the murder of Narendra accused No. 3 was happy
and gave them Rs. 10 to celeberate the occasion by seeing a
picture.
Accused No. 3 told accused No. 2 and Dinkar that
the following day they must take out all the goods from the
house of Dr. Nanavati and hand them over to him.
When Dinkar went to the house of accused No. 3 the following morning, Dinkar heard accused No. 2 and 3 saying that
•1Dr. Nanavati would not be able to live in that bungalow any
longer. Accused No. 2 and Dinkar then went to the bungalow
of Dr. Nanavati and opened the lock with the key which had
been removed from Narendra's pocket.
Accused No. 2
and
Dinkar locked the front door from outside and kept the back
door ajar and removed a large number of articles which were
in cupboards which they opened with the help of a bunch of
keys which they found in the house. Accused No. 2 antl Dinkar
again went to the bungalow of Dr. Nanavati on the subsequent
day.
They removed two cycles and several other articles and.
handed them over to accused No. 3.
Accused No. 3 gave to
the approver Dinkar a cycle and some of the property which
had been recover.~d from the house of Dr. N anavati.
Dr. Nanavati returned to Deolali along with his wife on 4
January, 1968. They found the front door of the house locked.
They made enquiries.
Ultimately, they entered the house
by
breaking open the lock and found that Narendra was not in the
house, that the whole house had been ransacked atld the back
door was ajar.
Dr. Nanavati reported the matter td the police.
Clue was furnished by a piece of cloth which had been stolen
from the house of Dr. Nanavati. That piece of cloth had been
given by accused No. 3 to the approver Dinkar who gave it to a
tailor named Thakur for stitching a pair of trousers for him.
Dr.
l\anavati happened to go to the shop of Thakur and made enquiries about the piece of cloth which was found in the tailor's
shop. Accused No. 2 and Dinkar took away the cloth from the
tailor's shop when they heard of the enquiries about the piece
of cloth.
Dinkar gave some money to the tailor.
Dinkar and
accused No. 2 raised some money by pledging a cycle which they
'hi!d .'~ith them. . The police came to the tailor's shop,
made
enqumes and ultnnately accused No. 2 and Dinkar were arrested
on 23 January, 1968.
Dinkar pointed out the place
of the
occurrence to the police on that day.
On 24 January, 1968
some human bones were found at that place.
On 25 January
1968 acc~sed No. 3 was arrested. Dinkar and· accused No. 2
made van~us statements and led the police to various
places.
Several articles stolen from the house of Dr. Nanavati were recovered.
On 12 February, 1968 Dinkar made a full-fledged:
detailed confession.
·622
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
[1971] 1 S.C.R.
In the High Court three questions were
canvassed.
Firs1,
whether there was corroboration in regard to the crime. Secondly,
whether there was corroboration in regard to accused
No.
2
and 3 being guilty of the offence.
Thirdly, whether there was
corroboration in regard to the approver's story about the conspiracy and the common intention by way of a pre-conceived plan
to murder Narendra.
The High Court found that there
was
corroboration of the evidence which connected accused No. 2
.and 3 not only with the offence of theft but also with murder.
The High Court also came to the conclusion that there was corroborat!on of the evidence of Dinkar in material particulars in
regard to the connection of the accused with the crime and in
regard to the conspiracy as we]] as the common intention.
The law with regard to appreciation of approver's evidence
.is based on the effect of sections 133 and 114 illustration ( b)
of the Evidence Act, namely, that an accomplice is competent
to depose but as a rule of caution it will be unsafe to convict
upon his testimony alone.
The warning of the danger of convicting on uncorroborated evidence is therefore given when the
evidence is that of an accomplice.
The
primary meaning of
.accomplice is any party to the crime charged and
some
one
who aids and abets the commission of crime.
The nature of
corroboration is that it is confirmatory evidence and it may consist of the evidence of second witness or of circumstances like
the conduct of the person against whom it is required. Corroboration must C<l\llllect or tend to connect the accused with
the time.
When it is said that the corroborative evidence must
implicate the accused in material particulars it means that it i>
not enough that a piece of evidence tends to confirm the lruth
of a part of the testimony to be corroborated.
That evidence
must confirm that 'Part of the testimony which suggests that the
•crime was committed by the accused. If a witness says that the
accused, and he stole the sheep and he put tl.e skins in a certain
place, the discovery of the skins in that place would not corroborate
the evidence i)f the witness as against the accused.
But if the
skins were found. in the )ccused's house, this would corroborate
because it would tend to confirm the statPment that the accused
had some hand in the theft.
This Court stat.ed the Jaw of corroboration of accomplice
evidence in several decisions.
One of the earlier decision
is
Sarwan Singh v. State of Punjab(') and the recent decision is
Lachi Ram v. State of Punjab(2). In Sarwan Singh's case(')
this .Court-laid down' that before the court would look into the
(I) (1957] S.C.R: 953.
(2) [l967] I S.CR. 243
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SHESHANNA V, MAHARASHTRA (Ray, J.)
623
corroborative evidence it was necessary to find out whether the
approver or accomplice was a reliable witness.
This Court in
Lachi Ram's case(1) said that the first test of reliability of approver and accomplice evidence was for the court to be satisfied that there was nothing inherently impossible in evidence.
After that conclusion is reached as to reliability corroboration
is required.
The rule as to corroboration is based on the reasoning
that there must be sufficient corroborative evidence in material
pa1ticulars to connect the accused with the crime.
In the present appeal, counsel on behalf of the appellant contended that
there
was no corroboration of the
actual participation in the murder and secondly that accused No. 3 could
be guilty of theft but not of murder.
The washerman said that
Dinkar was his classmate and through Dinkar he came to know
accused No. 2.
The washerman further said that he used to
wash the clothes o;f accused No. 2 and on 27 December, 1967
Dinkar and accused No. 2 came to the washerman's house to take
out a few clothes which he had washed for them.
The washerman also said that Dinkar and accused No. 2 had with them
a boy who was of fair skin and wore khaki shorts and a white
shirt.
Mohan Lal Boob, an agriculturist gave evidence that on 27
December, 1967 he was watering the crops.
Three persons turned up one of whom was accused No. 2 and the other was known
to him by face and the third was a boy of 14 or 15 years of
age wearing khaki shorts and a shirt.
Mohan Lal Boob said
that he saw all of them sitting down in the field,
drank water
and purchase radishes from a woman who was sitting nearby.
It may be difficult to find corroborative evidence
of
the
actual killing.
Dinkar showed the place of occurrence.
Eventually, a few things were discovered there, namely, a shirt, a
chain, a skull having the upper jaw with
13 teeth, a bone,
bunch of hair.
These things were found on 28 January, 1968.
The shirt and the chain were identified by Dr. Nanavati and
his wife to belong to Narendra.
A girl of 14 named Garadin
Bride who was a classmate of Narendra said that Narendra wore
a chain similar to the one that was shown.· The medical evidence was that the bones were those of a human being p~bably
a male.
Beyond that the medical evidence does not assist the .
proserution.
The High Court found that. the d~ath of Nare~dra ·
was not disputed because it was put to Dmkar m cross-exammation that it was Dinkar alone who killed Narendra.,
Theref~re.
the medical evidence as to the skull and the bone 1s not o~ llI\-
poitance in_ view of the death of. Narendra. Dr .. Nanavah en-
(1) (1967) I S.C.R. 243.
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SUPREME COURT REPORTS
[l 971] 1 S.C.R.
tered the house by breaking open the lock. He found the back
A
door left ajar.
The key which was produced by Dr. Nanavati
was found to fit the lock though the lock could not be operated
i
with the key itrJ. view of the fact that Dr. Nanavati had broken
it open for gaining entry into the house.
'
There is also evidence of Kisan Prasad that after Christmas
day in 1967 he saw a dead body which had on it khaki shorts
and white shirt. If the murder of Narendra and the theit were
not parts of the same transaction, Narendra would not have been
taken out to the field to be murdered there to eliminate the possibility of detection.
The close proximity between murder and
theft points to the inescapable conclusion that they formed part
of the same transaction.
Narendra was seen alive by Kewa~
Ram, owner of the betel shop on 26th December, 1967. Hira
Lal, the domestic servant of Dr. Nanavati left Deolali on 25
December, 1967.
The theft could not have been c01nmitted
before the murder because in that case there would be complaint
by Narendra and the house in that case would also have been
broken open for committing the murder.
All these features
prove that the murder and the theft formed ihe same transaction and were committed by the same persons.
Narendra was
seen alive in the company of accused Ne;>. 2 and Dinkar.
That
was the .evidence of the washerman as also of the agriculturist
Mohan Lal Boob.
These. witne~ses further identified the shorts
and shirt c.f Narendra.
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Accused No. 2 produced the piece of cloth which was identical with the cloth of the matteress cover produced by
Dr.
Nanavati.
Both the pieces of the cloth were of the identical
design.
The.pledgin~bf the cycle by accused No. 2 is of significance.
The cycle Was identified both by Dr. Nanavati · and .
his wife.
The next piece of evidence is that accused No. 2 sold
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some utensils to Gadekar.
One of the utensils was
found
to
have a name thereon scraped off.
There was also a piece of
hand-writing with the signature of accused No. 2 at the foot
of it and that was the list of the articles sold to Gadekar. There
were some articles found from the tailor's shop. The evidence of
the tailor was that that those articles were given by accused No. 2.
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The discovery
1 of the chain which Narendra wore was identified by
Dr. Nanavati. Accused No. 2 s,old a cycle carrier to Rupvate on
16 January, 1968. The sale of that article was 'discovered on 23
January, 1968. Dr. Nanavati identified the cycle carrier. That
identification was not challenged.
All these pieces of evidence
prove the connection of accused No. 2 with the crime.
H
With regard to accused No. 3 .it is found that there were
civil and criminal proceedings between him and Dr. Nanavati.
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SHiSHANNA I'. MAHARASHTRA (kay, J.)
625
Accused No. 3 had the motive not only to make it impos5ible
for Dr. Nanavati to stay in the bungalow but also to commit
theft in his house.
Accused No. 3 gave several articles to a
person called Takalkar.
Takalkar had dealings with accused
No. 3 in the past.
Takalkar said that accused No. 3 gave him
soii1e pieces from silver idols and other silver articles and wanted
money by disposing of the same. Takalkar purchaseu the entire
silver material from accused No. 3 for Rs. 175.
Takalkar also
said that at the request of accused No. 3 he kept that bag of
'utensils in his godown and gave the key of th~ godown
to
accused No. 3 who afterwards returned the key
The police
came to the shop of Takalkar and he was asked to produce the
gunny bag which he did.
The articles in the gunny bag were
taken and the articles excepting the ·lump of silver were identified by Dr. Nanavati and by his wife. The identification was not
challenged in cross-examination. It is obvious that silver lump
could not be identified.
At this
stage
it is to be noticed as
to whether there is evidence to connect accused No.
~ with
murder.
The transaction was one composite unit of murdering
Narendra and committing theft.
The discovery of articles in the godown of Takalkar was as
a result of a statement by accused No. 2..
The name of accused
No. 3 was found in the note-book of Takalkar. The relationship
of father and son between accused No. 3 and accused No. 2 is
not to be lost sight of.
Accused No. 2 and 3 went together
for the sale of cycle carrier to Rupvate: The High Court rightly
came to the conclusion· that there was sufficient corroboration
of the evidence o[ Dinkar in material particulars and that Dinkar
was a reliable witness and it was proved that accused No. 2 and
3 were guilty of the offence.
In view of the fact that there was
capital sentence of accused No. 3 we went through the evidence
to find out as to whether there was any infirmity in evidence. We
have found none.
The appeal therefore fails.
The accused will surrender to
his bail, if any.
Y.P.S.
Appeal dismissed.
· Lt3 Sup: C.l./70-11