Summary
At the trial of a person for murder by alleged poisoning, the fact of death by poisoning is provable by circumstantial evidence, notwithstanding that the autopsy as well as the chemical analysis fail to disclose any poison; though the cause of death may not appear to be established by direct evidence, the medical evidence of experts and the circumstances of the case may be sufficient to infer that the death must be the result of the administration to the victim of some unrecognised poison or drug which acts as a poison, and a conviction can be rested on circumstantial evidence provided that it is so decisive that the court can unhesitatingly hold that the death was not a natural one.
Per S. K. Das and M. Hidayatullah, jj.-Where the evidence showed that the appellant who was the medical adviser of the deceased, deliberately set about first to ingratiate himself in the good opinions of his patient and becoming her confidant, found out all about her affairs and gradually began managing her affairs, that all the time he was planning to get at her property and had forged her signature on a dividend warrant and had obtained undated cheque from her and then under the guise of helping her to have a consultation with a specialist in Bombay took her in a train, and then brought the patient unconscious to a hospital bereft of all property with which she had started from home and gave a wrong name to cover her identity and wrong history of her ailments, that after her death he abandoned the body to be dealt with by the hospital as an unclaimed body, spread the story that she was alive and made use of the situation to misappropriate all her properties, and that he tried by all means to avoid postmortem examination and when questioned gave false and conflicting statements, held that if the deceased died in circumstances which prima facie admit of either disease or homicide by poisoning one must look at the conduct of the appellant both before and after the death of the deceased, that the corpus delicti could be held to be proved by a number of facts which render the commission of the crime certain, and that the medical evidence in the case and the conduct of the appellant unerringly pointed to the conclusion that the death of the deceased was the result of the administration of some unrecognised poison or drug which would act as a poison and that the appellant was the person who administered it.461 Per Sarkar, J.-If it could be established in this case that the deceased had died an unnatural death, the conclusion would be inevitable that unnatural death had been brought about by poison, but the circumstances were not such that from them the only reasonable conclusion to be drawn was that the deceased died an unnatural death. Held, that the prosecution had failed to prove the guilt of the appellant.Regina v. Onufrejczyk, [1955] 1 Q.B. 388, The King v. Horry,[1952] N.Z.L. 111, Mary Ann Nash's case, (1911) 6 Cr. App.R. 225 and Donnall's case, (1817) 2 C.& K, 308n, considered and relied on.See the full content of this document
Extract
Anant Chintaman Lagu VS. The State Of Bombay
PETITIONER: ANANT CHINTAMAN LAGU Vs.RESPONDENT: THE STATE OF BOMBAYDATE OF JUDGMENT: 14/12/1959BENCH: HIDAYATULLAH, M.BENCH: HIDAYATULLAH, M.DAS, S.K.SARKAR, A.K.CITATION: 1960 AIR 500 1960 SCR (2) 460CITATOR INFO : F 1963 SC 74 (38)RF 1970 SC1321 (16)F 1972 SC1331 (32)D 1984 SC1622 (156,170)R 1988 SC1011 (9,27)ACT: Criminal Law-Murder by poisoning-Circumstantial evidence-Poison not detected in body of deceased-Conduct of accused, both before and after-Conviction for murder.JUDGMENT: CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION: Criminal Appeal No. 73 of 1959.Appeal by special leave from the judgment and order dated January 16/20th, 1959, of the Bombay High Court in Confirmation case No. 25 of 1958 with Criminal Appeal No.1372 of 1958, arising out of. the judgment and order dated October 27, 1958, of the Sessions Judge, Poona, in Sessions Case No. 52 of 1958.A. S. R. Chtiri, S. N. Andley, J. B. Dadachanji and Rameshwar Nath, for the appellant.H. N. Seervai, Advocate-General for the State of Bombay, Porus A. Mehta and R. H. Dhebar, for the respondent.1959. December 14. The Judgment of S. K. Das and Hidayatullah, JJ., was delivered by Hidayatullah, J. Sarkar,J., delivered a separate Judgment.HIDAYATULLAH J.-This appeal by special leave is against the judgment of the Bombay High Court [J. C. Shah, J. (now of the Supreme Court) and V. S. Desai, J.] by which it maintained the conviction of the appellant, Lagu, under s.302 of the Indian Penal Code, and confirmed the sentence of death passed on him by Shri V. A. Naik (now Naik, J.) Sessions Judge, Poona.The appellant was tried for the murder of one Laxmibai Karve, and the charge held proved against him was that on or about the night between November 12 and 13, 1956, either at Poona or in the course of a railway journey between Poona and Bombay, he administered to the said Laxmibai Karve, some unrecognised poison or drug which would act as a poison, 59462 with the intention of causing her death and which did cause her death.Laxmibai Karve was a resident of Poona where she lived at 93-95, Shukrawar Peth. Before her marriage of she was known as Indumati, Indutai or Indu Ponkshe. In the year 1922, she married Anant Ramachandra Karve, a widower with a son by name, Vishnu. On her marriage, as is the custom, she was named Laxmibai by the family of her husband and was known as Laxmibai Karve. She was also known as Mai or Mai Karve. From Laxmibai there were born two sons, Ramachandra (P.W. 1) and Purshottam alias Arvind, who died in 1954.Anant Ramachandra Karve was a moderately rich man, who had been successful in business. He died in 1945 of pleurisy. He was attended till his death by the appellant and his brother, B. C. Lagu, both of whom are doctors. Anant Ramachandra Karve left a will dated February 28, 1944. Prior to the execution of the will, he had gifted Rs. 30,000 to his son, Vishnu, to set him up in business. By his will he gave the house No. 93-95, Shukrawar Peth, Poona to Ramachandra with a right of residence in at least three rooms to his widow, Laxmibai and a further right to her to receive Rs. 50 per month from the rent of the house. He assigned an insurance policy of Rs. 5,000 in her favour. The business was left to Ramachandra. The cash deposits in Bank, Post Office and with other persons together with the right to recover loans from debtors in the Bhor State were given to Purushottam alias Arvind. Certain bequests of lands and debentures were made to Visbnu's children. Laxmibai was also declared owner of all her ornaments of about 60 tolas of gold and nose-ring and pearl bangles which were described in the will.In addition to what she inherited from her husband, Laxmibai inherited about Rs. 25,000 invested in shares from her mother, Girjabai, and another 60 tolas of gold ornaments. In January 1954, Purushottam alias Arvind died at Poona. By Purushottam's death Laxmibai also inherited all the property held by him.463 Thus, at the time of her death, Laxmibai possessed of about 560 shares in diverse Electric' Companies, debentures in South Madras Electric Supply Corporation and Mettur Chemical and Industrial Corporation, a sum of Rs. 7,882-15-0 at the Bank of Maharashtra, a sum of Rs. 35,000 in deposit with one Vasudeo Sadashiv Joshi, gold and pearl ornaments and sundry movables like clothes, house hold furniture, radio etc.In the year 1946, Ramachandra, the elder son, started living separately. There were differences between the mother and son. The latter had suffered a loss in the business and had mortgaged the house with one Shinde, who filed a suit, and obtained a decree but Vishnu filed a suit for partition claiming that his onethird share was not affected. Before this, Ramachandra had closed his business in 195 1, and joined the military. He was posted at different places, but in spite of their differences, mother and son used to correspond with each other. In May, 1956, Laxmibai arranged...
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