In S.L.P. (CRIMINAL) NO.4599 OF 2021-SC- Trial Court is enjoined with duty to apply its mind at time of framing of charge and it should not act as mere post office, says Apex Court Justices A.M. Khanwilkar, Abhay S. Oka & J.B. Pardiwala [26-07-2022]

Read Order: GHULAM HASSAN BEIGH v. MOHAMMAD MAQBOOL MAGREY & ORS 

Mansimran Kaur

New Delhi, July 27, 2022: While observing that upon appreciation of the entire evidence on record at the end of the trial, the Trial Court can decide if the case is of murder or culpable homicide, the Supreme Court has clarified that at the stage of framing of the charge, the trial court cannot reach to such a conclusion by merely relying upon the port mortem report on record. 

Reaffirming the settled position of law that in a criminal trial, the prosecution can lead evidence only in accordance with the charge framed by the Trial court, the Larger Bench of Justice A.M. Khanwilkar ,Justice Abhay S. Oka and Justice J.B. Pardiwala allowed the instant appeal preferred  at the instance of the original complainant directed against the order passed by the High Court of Jammu and Kashmir whereby the High Court rejected the revision application filed by the appellant and affirmed the order passed by the Additional Sessions Judge discharging the original accused persons from the offence of murder punishable under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code.

Upon affirmation, the Trial Court proceeded to frame charges against the accused persons for the offence of culpable homicide under Section 304 of IPC. The Bench was of the opinion that the once the trial court decides to discharge an accused person from the offence punishable under Section 302 of the IPC and proceeds to frame the lesser charge for the offence punishable under Section 304 Part II of the IPC, the prosecution thereafter would not be in a position to lead any evidence beyond the charge as framed.

Factual matrix of the case was such that an FIR was lodged by the appellant on March 22, 2020. It appeared from the FIR that the accused persons formed an unlawful assembly and assaulted the appellant as well as his family members after trespassing into the residential property of the appellant.  It was the case of the prosecution that all the accused persons trespassed into the residential property of the appellant and started damaging the tin fence. When the appellant herein tried to restrain the accused persons from causing any further damage, they all started assaulting the appellant by giving fisticuffs. 

The accused persons were also alleged to have caught hold of the deceased wife of the appellant and the daughter-in-law and both were beaten up as well. It was further alleged that the two female members of the family were dragged by the accused persons as a result of which the clothes of the deceased was torn thereby outraging her modesty.  Subsequently, the FIR was lodged under Sections 147, 354, 323, 451 and 302 of  IPC. 

After appreciating the evidence, the Trial Court deemed it fit to discharge the accused persons of the offence of murder punishable under Section 302 of the IPC and proceeded to frame charge against the accused persons for the offence of culpable homicide under Section 304 of IPC.  On being aggrieved by the same, the appellant assailed the legality of the order by filing a revision application before the High Court.  The same was dismissed by the High Court and the order passed by the Trial Court was restored. It was this impugned order that was under challenge in the present appeal. 

The Court took Sections 226, 227 and 228 of CrPC into consideration and also referred to its judgments in Sajjan Kumar v. CBI, Dipakbhai Jagdishchndra Patel v. State of Gujarat, Union of India v. Prafulla Kumar Samal and another pertaining to the determination of scope of Sections 227 and 228 of CrPC, In view of the aforesaid precedents, the Court noted “…it is evident that the trial court is enjoined with the duty to apply its mind at the time of framing of charge and should not act as a mere post office. The endorsement on the charge sheet presented by the police as it is without applying its mind and without recording brief reasons in support of its opinion is not countenanced by law.”

However, the material which is required to be evaluated by the Court at the time of framing charge should be the material which is produced and relied upon by the prosecution. The sifting of such material is not to be as meticulous as would render the exercise of a mini trial to find out the guilt or otherwise of the accused. All that is required at this stage is that the Court must be satisfied that the evidence collected by the prosecution is sufficient to presume that the accused has committed an offence, the Court further remarked. 

Coming to the facts of the present case, the Top Court stated that it had no iota of doubt that in the instant matter, the Trial Court could be said to have conducted a mini Trial while marshalling the evidence on record.  The trial court thought fit to discharge the accused persons from the offence of murder and proceeded to frame charge for the offence of culpable homicide under Section 304 of the IPC by only taking into consideration the medical evidence on record. The Trial court as well as the High Court got persuaded by the fact that the cause of death of the deceased as assigned in the post mortem report being the “cardio respiratory failure”, but the same cannot be said to be having any nexus with the alleged assault that was laid on the deceased, the Court observed. 

In furtherance of the same the Court noted that it is a settled position of law that in a criminal trial, the prosecution can lead evidence only in accordance with the charge framed by the Trial court. The Top Court thus opined that it would be apposite, seeing the facts of the present case to permit the prosecution to lead appropriate evidence in accordance with its original case as put up in the charge sheet. 

In light of these observations, the order of the High Court as well as the Trial Court was set aside and accordingly, the appeal was allowed.