Occurred At Spur Of Moment, Took Deceased To Hospital Immediately- SC Modifies Conviction Of Man Convicted For Murdering Wife

The Bench of Justice AS Bopanna and Justice PS Narasimha held that under these mitigating circumstances, the conviction under Section 302 IPC cannot be sustained, hence, the Court modified the judgment to hold the appellant guilty of the offence under Section 304 Part II IPC.

The Court directed for the release of the accused as he had already undergone 12 years of sentence holding it to be a sufficient punishment.

In this case, the appellant-accused had assailed the order of the Delhi High Court which had confirmed the conviction and sentence rendered by the Trial Court. The accused was charged with assaulting his deceased wife. The sole witness was his seven-year-old daughter who narrated the entire incident to the trial court.

The issue dealt with by the Apex Court was –

Whether even if the incident is accepted in the manner in which it had occurred, was it at the spur of the moment requires further consideration in the matter.

AOR Shekhar Prit Jha appeared for the Appellant before the Court.

The Court noted that the daughter in her cross-examination had stated that immediately her father had dressed up and moved her mother to the Hospital where the other family members are also stated to have gone and thus observed –

"These aspects of the matter would indicate that there was no pre-mediation to cause the death and the incident had occurred at the spur of the moment and the appellant having realised his mistake had thereafter taken immediate steps to shift his wife to the hospital but unfortunately she breathed her last."

Thus the Court held that the incident occurred at the spur of the moment and directed for the release of the Appellant and modified the conviction.

Accordingly, the appeal was partly allowed by the Court.

Cause Title – Jai Karan Yadav v. State (NCT of Delhi) through SHO

Click here to read/download the Order