The man had induced grievous damage to a girl by throwing acid at her in 2008. (representational)
New Delhi:
A Delhi court docket has upheld the sentence of 5 years’ rigorous imprisonment awarded to a person convicted of inflicting grievous damage to a girl by throwing acid at her in 2008.
Additional Sessions Judge Dharmender Rana was listening to the attraction of Rashid, who was sentenced by a magisterial court docket in October 2019 for the offence below part 326 (voluntarily inflicting grievous damage by harmful weapons or means) of the Indian Penal code.
“I do not find any reasons to interfere with the order of sentence. The appeal filed by convict or appellant is dismissed…,” the choose mentioned in a current order.
“Considering the totality of circumstances, I do not find any illegality or infirmity in the impugned judgment. I have no hesitation in holding that the trial court has rightly convicted the appellant for the commission of the offence under Section 326 IPC,” the choose added.
Regarding the order on sentence, the choose mentioned the magisterial court docket had already taken a lenient view and no additional interference was required.
The choose famous that in response to the prosecution, Rashid voluntarily induced grievous damage to the sufferer by throwing acid on her face on August 7, 2008, following which the IP Estate police station registered a case.
He mentioned the prosecution’s case was primarily based on the sufferer’s testimony throughout which she had categorically acknowledged that Rashid requested her to marry him and, after she refused, he threw acid at her.
“I find no infirmity in the approach of the trial court while convicting the appellant by relying upon the testimony of the complainant Manju… testimony…sounds cogent, convincing and consistent and the testimony…coupled with the uncontroverted medico-legal case (MLC)…conclusively establishes that…appellant caused grievous injuries to the complainant by throwing acid upon her,” the ASJ mentioned.
Rejecting the argument of Rashid’s advocate in regards to the non-examination of a public witness, the choose mentioned there is no such thing as a rule of legislation or prudence which warrants that fees can’t be sustained upon the energy of a solitary witness.
“The conviction can be sustained even upon the strength of solitary witness if the same is found sterling and creditworthy and the testimony of the injured cannot be ignored as the presence of the injured is established on record and it is virtually impossible that the injured would let off the real culprit merely to implicate an innocent man,” the choose mentioned.
It is a matter of frequent information that members of most of the people, for apparent causes, are too reluctant to come back and testify in a court docket of legislation, the choose added.
“ For the general apathy and indifference of the members of the general public, for obvious and probably justified reasons, the cause of justice cannot be made to suffer. The credit-worthy testimony of the complainant cannot be discarded merely on account of non-corroboration by the members of the general public,” the court docket mentioned.
It mentioned the reason for justice can’t be made to endure due to some lapses of the investigating officer (IO) and mere failure of the prosecution to show the grievance concerning Rashid’s marriage proposal is just too insignificant a difficulty, hardly having any bearing upon the deserves of the case.
Noting that the IO was examined within the case solely in February 2014, after seven years of the incident, the court docket mentioned, merely as a result of the IO forgot in regards to the seizure memo, the inadvertent omission wouldn’t belie the complete prosecution case.
The court docket referred to a 1981 judgment of the Supreme Court, in response to which the mere incontrovertible fact that the witness has not advised the reality with regard to a peripheral matter wouldn’t justify the entire rejection of proof.
“It is only where the testimony is tainted to the core, the falsehood and the truth being inextricably intertwined, that the court should discard the evidence…This court is not meant to reject the testimony of a witness on the slightest deflection, however, has a bounden duty to search the truth,” the court docket mentioned referring to the judgment.
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