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A division bench of Supreme Court consisting of Justice Ashok Bhushan and Navin Sinha has held that failure of discovery of dead body of the victim does not entitle accused to be acquitted on the ground of benefit of doubt. It was said by the court that such a failure is one of the factures amongst all the facts and circumstances of the case.
The present case is an appeal against the judgment of the Patna High Court which had convicted the appellant under section 364 of Indian Penal Code and had given him life imprisonment.
In the case victim was a 5-6 year old, school going boy. He was kidnapped from his school by the co-accused, Balram. Witnesses had last seen the victim with the appellant and Balram. Both the accused disclosed in their confession statement that they had killed the victim and buried his dead body in the river bed. The body was not found by the police. However, the belongings of the victim was found in the in the house of the appellant.
The co-accused was convicted by the Trail Court. However, the High Court acquitted himas a result of which the appellant was also acquitted against the charge under section 120B of IPC. Subsequently, the appellant challenged his conviction, under section 364A.
It was submitted by the counsel for the appellant that the friend of victim (PW-10) witnessed that Balram kidnapped the victim. It was further stated by the parents of victim that ransom calls were made by Balram. It was submitted by them that the acquittal of Balram made the conviction of appellant unsustainable. On the other hand it was stated by the counsel for state that acquittal of Balram was irrelevant as the nature of evidences present against the appellant .Therefore, his conviction has no interference.
The court took into consideration all the facts and circumstances and came to the conclusion that mere acquittal of o-accused cannot give benefit to the appellant. While dealing with the question of non-recovery of the dead body, court held that this ground alone cannot entitle an accused acquittal and dismissed the appeal, affirming the conviction of the appellant.
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