Bombay High Court: In the present appeal against the conviction under Section 235(2) CrPC and Section 302 of IPC, the Division Bench comprising of V. K. Tahilramani and B.P.Colabawala, JJ., on the basis of “Last Seen Together Theory”, recovery of deceased’s dead body, and the electric wire at the instance of the appellant-accused and an established motive of the appellant- accused, dismissed the case on basis of lack of merits and upheld the judgment and Order of the I/c Adhoc District Judge,
The case evolved from the disharmony in the relationship between the appellant- accused and his deceased wife. During the pendency of their divorce petition, the accused allegedly took his wife to a lodge, booked a room by using fake names for himself and his wife and in due course of their stay, the appellant-accused strangled his wife’s neck with an electric wire and caused her death.
The counsels for the appellant, Abhay Kumar Apte and V. V. Purwant, rendered no explanation or negation with respect to any of the components of the qualifying test whatsoever, except that the testimony of two witnesses should be considered unreliable due to the omissions made by both of them in their respective testimonies, which was ultimately denied by the Bench for being no help to the Court.
The present case which was based entirely on circumstancial evidence, the Bench relied heavily on the qualifying test laid down in Padala Veera Reddy v. State of Andhra Pradesh,1989 Supp (2) SCC 706, and in light of the decision, examined the present case in detail. On perusal the Court came to the conclusion that the prosecution has proved the guilt of the appellant-accused beyond reasonable doubt and rendered that the appellant- accused’s case qualifies all the tests and thus, cannot escape conviction awarded to him. Harish Ramesh Pulekar v. The State of Maharashtra, 2015 SCC OnLine Bom 2041, decided on 06.05.2015