High court pulls up trial judge, acquits murder accused

NEW DELHI - Acquitting a man accused of murder, the Delhi High Court has cautioned trial court judges on conducting trials vigilantly as any negligence on their part may result in gross injustice.

A division bench of Justice Pradeep Nandrajog and Justice Suresh Kait, acquitting Amarpal alias Rajpal of the nurder charge, said: “It is extremely unfortunate that the trial court judge has mechanically noted the evidence without discussing it.”

“It is unfortunate that we are repeatedly noting that the trial court judges are gullibly accepting, as gospel truth, whatever is spoken of by those who claim to be witnesses. The instant case is a classic example of how people can manage to tell lies and unless a judge is vigilant, gross injustice may result,” the court said.

In the present case, the head of a man was found lying in Jasola village in Sarita Vihar area in southeast Delhi.

According to prosecution, the witnesses saw the head of the man in the hand of Amarpal, caught him and handed him over to police Jan 13, 2002.

Criticising the trial court judge for blindly relying on the statements of witnesses who themselves are involved in various crimes in the area, the bench said: “The person who pointed the finger of accusation against the appellant is an accused in various crimes registered.”

“So, the trial judge was bound to consider, whether an unsolved crime has attempted to be shown as solved by taking help of people who are likely to be under police pressure or have contrived to settle some scores with appellant Amarpal,” the court said in an order delivered last week.

“The only way in which the trial judge could have unearthed the actual reason was to juxtapose the various sets of evidence as has been done by us. Had it been done, it would have dawned upon the learned trial judge that…the case of the prosecution led itself to self-destruction,” the bench noted.

It acquitted Amarpal of all charges and stressed the need for proper training of the judges at the lower level.

“We intend to carry out an academic exercise for the benefit of trial judges, so that they are guided, in future, as how should a court approach the task of appreciating evidence in relation to ocular evidence and the contemporaneous memos containing record of investigation prepared by police,” the court said.

“It is the duty of the trial court judges to see with microscopic eyes, all evidence and then test the veracity of witness account,” the bench said.