JUDGMENT SHEET

IN  THE  HIGH  COURT  OF  SINDH, CIRCUIT  COURT,  LARKANA

Crl.Acquittal Appeal.No.D-39 of 2022.

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DATE            ORDER WITH SIGNATURE OF HON’BLE JUDGE

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Before:

Mr. Justice Adnan Iqbal Chaudhry,

 Mr. Justice Zulfiqar Ali Sangi,

01. For orders on M.A.No.1202/2023.

02. For orders on office objection “A”

03. For orders on M.A.No.5433/2022.

04. For hearing of main case.

14.03.2023

           Mr. Suhail Ahmed Veesar, Advocate for appellant.

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ZULFIQAR  ALI  SANGI, J;- Through listed Criminal Acquittal Appeal, the appellant/complainant has assailed the judgment dated 12.12.2022, passed by learned 1^st Additional Sessions Judge/MCTC, Larkana, in Sessions Case No.581/2021 (Re. St. Vs. Abdul Waheed and others), outcome of FIR bearing Crime No.52/2021, for offence punishable U/S.302, 34 PPC,  registered with Police Station, Badeh, whereby private respondents/accused Abdul Waheed and three others were acquitted by extending them benefit of doubt.

2.     The facts of the case are already mentioned in memo of Crl.Acquittal Appeal and copy of FIR is attached, hence the same need not to be repeated.

3.     At trial, the prosecution examined in all eight witnesses who produced certain relevant documents in support of their statements. Thereafter, the learned State Counsel closed side of prosecution.

4.     The private respondents/accused in their statements recorded in terms of Section 342 Cr.PC denied the allegations leveled against them by pleading their innocence. However, they neither examined themselves on oath nor led any evidence in their defence.  

5.     The learned trial Court after hearing the counsels for the parties and evaluation of the evidence, acquitted the private respondents/accused by way of impugned judgment, as discussed above.

6.     Per learned counsel for the appellant/complainant that learned trial Court has passed the judgment in violation of law and there was sufficient material available on record to convict the private respondents/accused but learned trial Court acquitted them on flimsy grounds; that the evidence of complainant was corroborated by his witnesses and no major contradiction was noticed in their evidence; that the judgment passed by the learned trial Court is not based on sound reasoning. Lastly, he prayed for setting aside of the impugned judgment and issuance of notice to the concerned for regular hearing of the instant criminal acquittal appeal. In support of his contentions, he relied upon cases of Muhammad Yaqoob Vs. The State (2021 SCMR-1387) and Muhammad Nadeem alias Deemi Vs. The State (2021 SCMR-872).

7.     Heard learned counsel for the appellant/complainant and perused the material made available on the record with their able assistance.

8.     The careful perusal of evidence brought on record is entailing that the all witnesses have tried to support the case of prosecution but their evidence on scrutiny was found carrying some material infirmities. In that PW Irfan in his cross examination stated that they had come to the house of deceased to take money from deceased for agricultural purpose whereas PW Abdul Haleem in his examination-in-chief stated that he had gone to Badeh alongwith Irfan for work and reached at house of Ashique at 1700 hours and after work Ashique asked them to stay at his house over night as it was dark, therefore, they stayed there for night and had dinner. Further, the broad features involved in the present case were that the incident took place on 06.08.2021 at about 01.30 A.M (night) but the FIR of murder of deceased was registered by his brother/complainant on 13.06.2021 with scandalous delay of about seven days to the incident which obviously reflects consultation. Furthermore, the identification of the accused is based upon bulb light which is always presumed to be weak piece of evidence as has been held by the Honourable Apex Court. All these improbabilities in the case are sufficient to render the entire story of the complainant to be highly doubtful. Thus, without going into other contradictions in the evidence of prosecution witnesses, we are of the view that the learned trial Court has rightly recorded acquittal of the private respondents.

9.     It is well settled by now that the scope of appeal against acquittal is very narrow and there is a double presumption of innocence and that the Courts generally do not interfere with the same unless they find the reasoning in the impugned judgment to be perverse, arbitrary, foolish, artificial, speculative and ridiculous as was held by the Honourable Supreme      Court in case of State Versus Abdul Khaliq and others       (PLD 2011 SC-554), wherein the Hon’ble Supreme Court has held as under;-

From the ratio of all the above pronouncements and those cited by the learned counsel for the parties, it can be deduced that the scope of interference in appeal against acquittal is most narrow and limited because in an acquittal the presumption of innocence is significantly added to the cardinal rule of criminal jurisprudence, that an accused shall be presumed to be innocent until proved guilty; in other words, the presumption of innocence is doubled. The courts shall be very slow in interfering with such an acquittal judgment, unless it is shown to be perverse, passed in gross violation of law, suffering from the errors of grave misreading or non-reading of the evidence; such judgments should not be lightly interfered and heavy burden lies on the prosecution to rebut the presumption of innocence which the accused has earned and attained on account of his acquittal. It has been categorically held in a plethora of judgments that interference in a judgment of acquittal is rare and the prosecution must show that there are glaring errors of law and fact committed by the Court in arriving at the decision, which would result into grave miscarriage of justice; the acquittal judgment is perfunctory or wholly artificial or a shocking conclusion has been drawn. Moreover, in number of dictums of this Court, it has been categorically laid down that such judgment should not be interjected until the findings are perverse, arbitrary, foolish, artificial, speculative and ridiculous (Emphasis supplied). The Court of appeal should not interfere simply for the reason that on the re-appraisal of the evidence a different conclusion could possibly be arrived at, the factual conclusions should not be upset, except when palpably perverse, suffering from serious and material factual infirmities. It is averred in The State v. Muhammad Sharif (1995 SCMR 635) and Muhammad Ijaz Ahmad v. Raja Fahim Afzal and 2 others (1998 SCMR 1281) that the Supreme Court being the final forum would be chary and hesitant to interfere in the findings of the Courts below. It is, therefore, expedient and imperative that the above criteria and the guidelines should be followed in deciding these appeals.

10.    The sequel of above discussion is that the learned trial Court has committed no illegality or irregularity while recording acquittal of the private respondents/accused by way of impugned judgment, which even otherwise does not call for any interference by this Court by way of instant Criminal Acquittal Appeal. The same being devoid of merits is dismissed in limine together with listed application(s).

                                JUDGE
                            JUDGE.