Cannot convict accused on moral grounds: HC in alleged caste honour killing

In our criminal justice system, for an accused to be convicted, it is but required that the guilt of the accused be established beyond a reasonable doubt —HC

S Shyam Prasad | NT

Bengaluru: The High Court of Karnataka has acquitted five people accused of an alleged honour killing. They were convicted by the II Additional District and Sessions and Special Judge, Dharwad, on March 24, 2018, for murder. But the HC found their convictions wrong and acquitted them on November 4, 2022.

“The conviction of an accused cannot be on the basis of moral grounds, but would have to be based on sound legal principles established by the evidence on record,” the division bench of Justice Suraj Govindaraj and Justice G Basavaraja said.

Fakirappa Bailappa Byali from Mangalagatti in Dharwad was the main accused in the case. His daughter-in-law allegedly had an affair with a Dalit man. So he allegedly hatched a plan to kill them both and hired nine others. The case of the prosecution was that the deceased had an illicit relationship with the daughterin-law of accused No.1 Fakirappa.

The deceased belonged to the SC/ ST community, accused No.1 belonged to the Lingayat community, the deceased, having a continued illicit relationship with the daughter-in-law of accused No.1, had a grudge against the deceased, and it is for that reason that accused No.1 had engaged the services of other accused to commit the murder of his daughter-in-law as well as the murder of the deceased.

On August 8, 2014 accused Fakirappa and other accused had entered into a conspiracy to commit the said murders, for which Fakirappa had promised to make payment of a sum of Rs 5,00,000. The other accused took the deceased for dinner in the car of the deceased and at a preplanned place, requested the deceased to stop the car so that they could attend to nature’s call.

The murder was committed and the victim’s body was thrown away in a field. The trial court had convicted the accused of murder, conspiracy, and other charges. Five of the accused including Fakirappa approached the HC with an appeal. Two of the other accused have died in the meantime, and others are out on bail already.

The HC noted in its November 4 judgement that the daughterin-law was not even questioned. “The allegation is that there was an illicit relationship between the deceased and daughter-in-law of accused No.1, there is no other person in the village and or family, who has been examined to establish this fact.

There are only vague allegations and statements made in this regard in the charge sheet which has not been established by cogent evidence,” the HC said. Neither the daughter-in-law of accused No.1 was examined and her statement recorded, nor is the statement of the son of accused No.1 recorded.

This is more so when the case of the prosecution was that accused No.1 had engaged the services of other accused to murder the said Mallavva and the deceased. The accused were also charged under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, but the trial court had not found them guilty under this law.

Acquitting the accused, the HC said, “In our criminal justice system, for an accused to be convicted, it is but required that the guilt of the accused be established beyond a reasonable doubt. In the present case, as aforesaid, there is no evidence on record to implicate the accused in the crime though there are conjunctures drawn by the investigating officer as also by the trial Court to implicate the accused.”