Mutum B.K. Singh, J.
1. The judgment dated 23rd March, 2002 of the Court of learned Additional Sessions Judge. South Tripura. Udaipur, passed in Case No. S.T. 100(ST/S) of 2001, convicting the appellants under Section 498-A of the Indian Penal Code and sentencing the appellant No. 1 to suffer rigorous imprisonment for two years and a fine of Rs. 2,000/-, in default of payment, to suffer additional rigorous imprisonment for three months and the appellant No. 2 to suffer rigorous imprisonment for six months and a fine of Rs. 5000/-, in default of payment, to suffer rigorous imprisonment for three months, is under challenge in this appeal.
2. That, the prosecution case which originated from a complaint filed before the Court learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, South Tripura, Udiapur is that in 1991 one Kajal Majumdar (since deceased) married with the appellant No. 1. From the very next day of the marriage she started living at the house of her husband but she was tortured and subjected to harassment by the appellants and their family members continuously demanding more money and gold ornaments from her parental house. In 1992 she gave birth to a premature baby and suffered from acute illness with profuse bleeding but no medical treatment was given to her. The re quests for taking her to her parental house for treatment were turned down by the appellant No. 1. In 1995, on her refusal/failure to meet the demand of the appellant, she was assaulted/slapped in presence of the complainant. She sent many letters to her father through a messenger namely, Rakhal Nath, narrating about her miserable life and asking either to pay Rs. 10,000/- or to take her back to her parental house and that the last letter was on 18-3-1996. On 21-4-1996, when the complainant visited the house of his sister she was found lying seriously ill but no medical treatment was afforded to her by the family members of the appellants. On 23-4-1996 the complainant again visited the house of his sister on learning that his sister (Kajal Majumder) died on the previous day and the dead body was cremated without giving information to the family members of the complainant. Thereafter, he lodged a written complaint to the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, South Tripura, Udaipur on 27-4-1996, who endorsed the same to the Sabroom Police Station for investigation. Accordingly, Sabroom P.S. Case No 34/1996 under Sections 498-A and 304-B of IPC was registered and investigated.
3. That, the Investigating Officer submitted the charge-sheet against the appellants, father-in-law and brother-in-law of the deceased for committing offences punishable under Sections 498-A and 304-B of the Indian Penal Code. The learned trial Court, being satisfied with the materials on record, framed charges under Sections 498-A and 304-B, IPC against all the accused persons, to which all pleaded not guilty and thus, stood trial.
4. That, during the course of trial, the prosecution examined 9 (nine) witnesses and also exhibited 9 documents. One defence witness was examined on behalf of the accused persons. The learned trial Court, after a full-dressed trial, convicted the appellants under Section 498-A of IPC and acquitted the other two accused persons. The learned trial Court exonerated all the accused persons from the charge levelled them for the offence punishable under Section 304-B of IPC for want of evidence against which no appeal has been filed by the prosecution.
5. That, the defence case before the learned trial Court was the total denial of the charges against them. According to them, late Kajal Majumder was not in good health and suffering from illness, she was provided with all medical treatment as available in the locality but she died ultimately. She was never subjected to any cruelty by the appellants and their family members. The complainant was present at the time of her death but he left the house of the appellants with the assurance that he would come back in the afternoon with his parent. None from the parental side of late Kajal Majumder arrived at the house of the appellants till late evening, the dead body of Kajal Majumder was cremated in the evening of 22-4-1996 on the advice of the village elders.
6. Heard Mr. D. Chakraborty, learned Counsel appearing for the appellants and also Mr. A. Ghosh, learned Addl. Public Prosecutor for the State-respondent.
7. The learned Counsel appearing for the appellants submits that the prosecution was miserably failed to prove the charges levelled against the appellants but the learned trial Court basing solely on the unreliable and uncorroborated statement of the com plaint (P.W. No. 1) convicted the appellants which is not only illegal but also tainted with perversity and liable to be quashed. According to the appellants' learned Counsel, the learned trial Court passed the impugned judgment by mis-appreciating the evidences on record and misreading the provisions of law. The Additional Public Prosecutor, on the contrary, contended that the prosecution has clearly established and proved that the deceased was subjected to harassment by the appellants continuously during her lifetime to bring more money from her parental house.
8. That, before going into the merit of the case, it may be useful to highlight the ingredients to be fulfilled for conviction of a person for an offence punishable under Section 498-A of IPC. Section 498-A of the IPC was introduced with an object to combat the menace of dowry death and harassment to the married woman by the husband and his relatives. Section 498-A of IPC reads as follows: 'Whoever, being the husband or the relative of the husband of a woman, subjects such woman of cruelty shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years and shall also be liable to fine'. The term 'cruelty' for the purpose of Section 498-A of IPC has been defined in the explanation appended to the section itself. The term 'cruelty' means (a) any willful conduct which is of such nature as it likely to drive the woman to commit suicide or to cause grave injury or danger to life, limb or health whether mental or physical of the woman; or (b) harassment of the woman where such harassment is with a view to coercing her or any person related to her to meet any unlawful demand for any property or valuable security or is on account of failure by her or any person related to her to meet such demand. From a plain reading of the above provision, it is clear that in order to book a person under Section 498-A of IPC, the prosecution is required to prove that the woman is subjected to cruelty to such a degree which is likely to drive her to commit suicide or to cause grave injury, danger to life, limb or health (whether mental or physical) or harassment with a view to coercing her or any persons related to her to meet any unlawful demand. It shows that the prosecution has to prove that the deceased ws harassed to meet any unlawful demand from the side of the appellants' family.
9. That, keeping in view of the above provision of law and upon hearing the submissions of both the parties, I have anxiously examined the depositions of the witnesses and other materials on record in order to satisfy myself as to whether the conviction and sentence of the appellants have been well proved by the prosecution in the given facts and circumstances of the case. The admitted facts emerged from the depositions of the witnesses are that the deceased married with the appellant No. 1 in 1991, she gave birth to a still-born baby in 1992, her parent was informed about her illness by sending a telegram marked Exbt.-6 dated 18-9-1992 and she expired on 22-4-1996.
10. That, the learned trial Court, in para graph No. 17 of the impugned judgment, admitted that the statement of the P.W. No. 1 and the contents of the letters alleged to have been written by the deceased were not corroborated by other witnesses. It appears that the learned trial Court passed the impugned order under the impression that the offences against a woman are ordinarily taken place within the four corners of the matrimonial home and it may not be possible even for the close neighbours to know what was going on within the four walls of the neighbour and it is quite probable and natural that, for a woman it would be rather embarrassing to disclose her miseries to the members of the other family. Under the above impression, the learned trial Court held that the statement of P.W. No. 1, even in the absence of any corroboration, cannot be said to be unreliable. Such finding of the learned trial Court is illogical and contrary to the settled principle that the guilt of the accused person is required to be proved be yond all reasonable doubt by the prosecution. It does not mean to say that conviction cannot be based on the uncorroborated testimony of a solitary witness. It is settled principle that law does not require plurality of witnesses, testimony of a single witness is sufficient for conviction if such sole testimony is found to be trustworthy, reliable and inspire confidence of the Court.
11. That, reverting to the facts of the present case, there is no evidence that the deceased-Kajal Majumder was subjected to harassment during the period from 1991 to 1994. The P.W. No. 1, brother of the de ceased, however, stated that in 1992 his sister gave birth to a still born baby with pro fuse bleeding but no medical treatment was afforded to her, in 1995, i.e., after about 4 years of marriage of the deceased, he saw once the appellant No. 1 demanding Rs. 10,000/- from his sister and on her refusal, the appellant No. 1 slapped his sister. He brought the matter to the notice of the villagers, namely, Krihsna Das, Sunil Das and others. The said villagers went to the house of the appellants and settled the matter. On 21-4-1996 he again visited the house of his sister and found her lying on bed in a pre carious condition, the family members of the appellants made arrangement for her treatment from a quack only, no proper medical treatment was given to her. On 23-4-1996 he again visited the house of his sister on learning that his sister expired on the previous day and cremated the dead body without giving information to them. The above testimony of P.W. No. 1 that in 1995 the appellant No. 1 slapped the deceased on her refusal to meet the demand of Rs. 10,000/- from the side of the appellants and the matter was later on settled by the villagers is not found to be wholly reliable and trustworthy as there is no evidence indicating about such settlement by the villagers. Sri Krishna Das, the person to whom the P.W. No. 1 claimed to have reported the matter was not examined by the prosecution and the other Sri Sunil Das, in his testimony, did not state anything about the alleged settlement. He stated that he knew nothing about any strain relationship between the deceased and her husband, their relationship was good to his knowledge. The testimony of P.W. No. 1 in its entirety demonstrates only that the deceased was slapped by the appellant No. 1 once in 1995 and no proper medical treatment was afforded to the deceased while she was lying ill. However, it is in the evidence that no doctor was available in or nearby Thaibung village in which the deceased was residing with her husband and that the deceased was provided with all medical facilities as available in the village.
12. That, the statement of P.W. No. 1 that the deceased was subjected to harassment in 1995 finds no support from the testimony of the other prosecution witnesses. The statement of the mother of the deceased (P.W. No. 2) that she was informed by the deceased about the torture meted out to her by her husband demanding more money is nothing but a hearsay evidence which is inadmissible. On the contrary, the testimony of P.W. No. 4, a distant relative of the deceased, shows that on several times he met the deceased but the deceased never made any complaint about any act of harassment. Except the above piece of evidence that in 1995 the deceased was once slapped by the appellant No. 1, there is no other direct evidence to show that the deceased was harassed by the appellants and their family members with a view to force her to meet any unlawful demand.
13. That, the prosecution, however, relied upon four letters, marked Exbts. 2, 3, 4 and 5 respectively puportedly addressed to the father of the deceased to prove that the deceased was subjected to harassment in 1995 and 1996 relating to the unlawful demand of money from the family members of the appellants. The claim of the prosecution that the said letters were sent by the deceased to her father was strongly denied by the defence as manufactured document. According to the defence, the handwritings contained in the said letters are not the handwritings of the deceased, the said letters were manufactured after filing the complaint case against the appellants. Admittedly, these documents (letters) were seized subsequently on production by P.W. No. 1 during the course of investigation. P.W. No. 1 claimed that he is conversant with the handwritings and signature of the deceased and exhibited the said letters. It may be pointed out that the prosecution neither produced any other writings of the deceased to compare with the writings contained in the said letters by the Court nor sent the said letters for examination by the handwriting expert. In ordinary course, the handwriting and the contents therein are inadmissible unless proved before the Court by the direct evidence of the maker. The Court, of course, may rely on such documents basing on the opinion of such persons who acquainted with the handwriting contained in those letters. Explanation to Section 47 of the Evidence Act provides that 'a person is said to be acquainted with the handwriting of another person when he has seen that the person write, or when he has received documents purporting to be written by that person in answer to documents written by himself under his authority and addressed to that person, or when, in the ordinary course of business, documents purporting to be written by the person have been habitually submitted to him.' In other words, a person may be considered to be acquainted with the writings of the another if he has seen the controversial document while writing by another or written such document in answer to the document written by him in ordinary course of business. The documents marked Exbts. 2, 3, 4 and 5 were not sent to P.W. No. 1, the same were addressed to the father of the deceased and it is not the case that the P.W. No. 1 had seen the deceased while writing the alleged documents. P.W. No. 2, the mother of the deceased, never mentioned anything about the said letters in her testimony.
14. Thus, the opinion of P.W. No. 1 that the handwriting contained in the said letters were of his deceased sister is hard to believe in the absence of any other cogent and reliable evidence on record. The provision of Section 32 of the Evidence Act is also not attracted in the present case as the charge under Section 304-B of IPC has not been proved by the prosecution. The testimony of P.W. No. 6, who stated in his previous statement that the deceased used to send letters to him from time to time for reaching to her parental home is not concerned with the contents and handwritings of the said letters.
15. That, from the above testimonies of the prosecution witnesses and the documents available on record, it is clear that the prosecution could not prove any instance of harassment to the deceased during the period from 1991 to 1994 and in 1996. The P.W. No. 1, however, stated that on one occasion in 1995 the deceased was slapped by her husband which according to P.W. No. 1 was for refusal by the deceased to meet the demand of money to be brought from the deceased's parental house. There is no evidence that the appellants went on demanding more money or dowry right from the marriage of the deceased. As the testimony of P.W. No. 1 is not found to be wholly unblemished and beyond all reasonable criticism, it would be, in my considered view, unsafe to convict the appellants solely on the basis of such uncorroborated statement of P.W. No. 1 of the alleged harassment said to have been occurred once to the deceased during her married life.
16. That, having regard to the above discussions and observations, I am of the view that the prosecution could not prove beyond all reasonable doubt that the appellants have committed offence punishable under Section 498-A of IPC. Resultantly, the appellants are acquitted on the benefit of doubt. The judgment of conviction and sentence dated 23-3-2002 passed by the learned Additional Sessions Judge, South Tripura, Udaipur, in S.T. No. 100 (ST/S) of 2001 is set aside. The appeal is, accordingly, allowed. The bail bonds and the surety bonds stand discharged.
Send down the lower Court records immediately.