SHANMUGHANversusSTATE OF KERALA

                    [2012] 1 S.C.R. 411


                      SHANMUGHAN                                A
                              v.
                    STATE OF KERALA
            (Criminal Appeal No. 1157 of 2007)
                    JANUARY 19, 2012
                                                                B
   [ASOK KUMAR GANGULY AND T.S. THAKUR, JJ.]

     Penal Code, 1860 - ss. 3231302 - Conviction and
sentence under - Death of appellant's wife as a result of
poisoning on having been administered cyanide - Conviction C
of appellant u/ss. 3231302 alongwith imposition of life
imprisonment by courts below - lnterlerence with - Held: Not
called for - Prosecution succeeded in proving the motive of
the appellant - Entire chain of circumstances is consistent with
the guilt of the appellant - There were clear injuries on the D
deceased which show that some force was used while
administering the poison - Without any force these injuries
could not be there in a case of suicidal poisoning - Evidence
of doctor who conducted post mortem confirmed the same -
Appellant and the deceased admittedly slept together on the. E
night of occurrence inside a bed room and no third person
was there to apply force on the victim - Administration of
poison took place inside the bed room which could only be
administered by the appellant - Thus, prosecution rightly
proved that it was a case of murder.                             F
      'R'-wife of appellant died as a result of poisoning on
having been administered cyanide. The relationship
between 'R' and the appellant were strained. There was
evidence of mal-treatment of 'R' by the appellant. Also few
weeks prior to the death of 'R', there was some quarrel         G
between the parties. The trial court convicted the
appellant under Sections 3231302 IPC and sentenced him
to life imprisonment The High Court upheld the order of

                             411                                H
    412      SUPREME COURT REPORTS            (2012) 1 S.C.R.

A the trial court. Therefore, the appellant filed the instant
  appeal.

          Dismissing the appeal, the Court

       HELD: 1.1 When a case is sought to be proved by
B the prosecution on the basis of circumstantial evidence,
  the burden on the prosecution is that it must prove each
  circumstance in such a way as to complete the chain and
  at the same time it should be consistent with the guilt of
  the accused. Any reasonable doubt in proving the
C circumstances must be resolved in favour of the accused.
  The accused must be given the benefit of any fact or
  circumstance which is consistent with his innocence,
  which is to be presumed, unless the contrary is proved
  by chain of circumstances. In the instant case, the
D prosecution succeeded in proving the motive of the
  appellant and the entire chain of circumstances is
  consistent with the guilt of the appellant. On the fateful
  night, admittedly nobody was present in the bed room
  where the appellant and the deceased were sleeping as
E husband and wife. The victim admittedly screamed at
  about 2 a.m. This attracted the inmates of the house to
  rush to the bed room to find the victim dead as a result
  of administering of poison. This is not disputed. [Paras
  7, 8 and 9) [417-A-E]
F      1.2. It is the case of the prosecution that the victim
  diet! of cya[lide poison which is a highly corrosive poison
  and is obtained by distilling potassium cyanide or
  potassium ferrocyanide with dilute sulphuric acid. The
  post mortem exar_nination in cases of death by
G administering such corrosive poison,would show that the
  mouth, lips, skin and mucous membrane are corroded in
  patches and in acute cases, the same may be charred.
  [Paras 10 and 11) [417-F-G; 418-A]

H         Medical Jurisprudence and Toxicology by Modi 24th
         SHANMUGHAN v. STATE OF KERALA                    413


 Edition Year 2011 Page 260, Chapter 12, Section 2 -             A
 referred to.

       1.3. In the instant case, it is found from the injuries
· that there is presence of lacerated wounds on the lips,
  contusions in the ear and abrasions in the chest. These        8
  injuries clearly show that some force was used while
  administering the poison. Without any force these injuries
  could not be there in a case of suicidal poisoning. Apart
  from the appellant no one was there in bed room to apply
  force on the victim. That apart the evidence of PW 7,          C
  doctor who conducted post mortem also showed that all
  the injuries were fresh injuries and cannot be sustained
  by fall on a hard substance. PW 7 also deposed that the
  injuries could be because of forcible administration of
  poison. Thus, the prosecution rightly proved that it was
  a case of murder. [Para 12) [418-B-D]                          D

     Sharad Birdhichand Sarda vs. State of Maharashtra
 (1984) 4 SCC116: 1985 (1) SCR 88 - referred to.

      1.4. The appellant and the deceased were admittedly        E
 sleeping together on the night of occurrence inside a bed
 room and no third person was there and administration
 of poison took place inside the bed room. There are clear
 injuries on the deceased, which cannot be self inflicted.
 Therefore, poison could only be administered by the
 accused-appellant. [Paras 15 and 18) [419-C-D; 420-C-D]         F

     Anant Chintaman Lagu vs. The State of Bombay AIR
 1960 SC 500: 1960 SCR 460; Bhupinder Singh vs. State of
 Punjab (1988) 3 SCC 513: 1988 (3) SCR 409; Nirmala Devi
 vs. State ofJ & K (1994) 1 SCC 394 - referred to.       G

     1.5. At the time of his statement under Section 313
 Cr.P.C also, the attention of the accused-appellant was
 specifically drawn by the trial court to the injuries on the
                                                                 H
                                                          I
    414      SUPREME COURT REPORTS                [2012] 1 S.C.R.

A deceased. To that the appellant did not give any answer.
  Therefore, taking all these facts and also the concurrent
  findings of the two courts, interference is not called for.
  [Para 22 and 23) [421-D-F]
                         Case Law Reference:
B
          1985 (1) SCR 88         Referred to.          Para 13
          1960 SCR 460            Referred to.          Para 16
          1988 (3) SCR 409        Referred to.          Para 20
c         (1994) 1 sec 394        Referred to.          Para 21
        CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Criminal Appeal
    No. 1157 of 2007.

D        From the Judgment and Order dated 13.06.2006 of the
    High Court of Kerala at Ernakulam in Criminal Appeal No. 1303
    of 2003.

        Venkat Subramonium T.R., Satya Mitra and Romy Chacko
E for the Appellant.
          Liz Mathew, Sama A.R. Khan for the Respondent.

          The Judgment of the Court was delivered by

F         GANGULY, J.

        1. This appeal is from the judgment and order of conviction
  dated 13.6.2006 of the Division Bench of the Kerala High Court
  in Criminal Appeal No. 1303 of 2003 whereby the High Court
  confirmed the judgment and order of sentence of the learned
G Trial Judge. The Sessions Judge, Thrissur in Sessions Case
  No. 224 of 2002 convicted the appellant under Sections 323/
  302 l.P.C and gave him life imprisonment. No separate
  sentence was given for Section 323.

H
           SHANMUGHAN v. STATE OF KERALA                     415
              [ASOK KUMAR GANGULY, J.]
     2. The material facts as appearing from the judgments are       A
that one Raji, wife of the appellant died as a result of poisoning
on having been administered cyanide on the night of 2nd
March, 1992. In this case, there are certain admitted facts:
      1.     The victim Raji was sleeping on the fateful day in      8
             the bed room with her husband- the appellant
             herein.

      2.     The deceased and the appellant had a love
             marriage atiout 14 years prior to the incident.
                                                                     c
      3.     They had three children from the said marriage.

      4.     There is evidence of mal-treatment of the deceased
             by .the appellant.
      5.     Their son PW 5 deposed that there were some             D
             quarrel between the father - appellant and mother
             - deceased and with the intervention of neighbours
             the deceased was sent to her parental home.
     3. This happened couple of weeks prior to the death of the E
deceased. It is also evident from the evidence that the appellant
devel6ped suspicion about the character of the deceased and ·
tortured her in the past. There is evidence of the deceased
suffering from burn injuries from cigarette buts inflicted by the
appellant. Therefore the relationship between the couple was F
strained.                   ·

      4. PW 7 Dr. N. Rajaram, Lecturer in Forensic medicine,
Medical College, Thrissur who conducted the post mortem
examination on the body of the deceased found the following G
injuries on the body of the deceased. The injuries.are set out
herein below:
     1. Abrasion 0.4x0.1 cm oblique over the back of chest; its ·-
     lower end 17.5 cm above the hip bone and its upper end
     9.6 cm to the right of midline.                               H
    416       SUPREME COURT REPORTS                  [2012] 1 S.C.R.

A         2. Crescentic abrasion 0.5x0.1 cm vertical over the back
          of lower part of chest; its upper end 6.5 cm to the left of
          midline; its lower end 21.5 above hip.
          3. Skin contusion 1x0.6 cm and 1. 7x0.8 cm over the front
          and back of left ear lobule
B
          4. Skin deep irregular wound 1.1x0.3 cm over the back of
          root of left ear.

          5.   Lacerated wound 0.3x0.2 cm over the mucosa!
c         aspect of upper lip in between the left canine and 1st
          premolar.

          6.Lacerated wound 0.5x0.2 cm over the mucosa! aspect
          of lower lip opposite the lower left canine..
D         7. Lacerated wound 1.3x0.6 cm over the mucosa! aspect
          of lower lip close to the left angle of mouth and in between
          injury number 5 and 6.
         5. Assailing the concurrent finding of facts, the learned
E counsel appearing for the appellant made his first submission
  . that the prosecution has not proved that the appellant was in
    possession of the poison which is said to have been
    administered on the deceased. The next argument is that the
    defence suggestion that the deceased committed suicide by
F taking poison herself cannot be ruled out in view of the fact that
   the deceased was not going out any where and was simply
    confined in her house.
       6. The next submission of the learned counsel is that there
  is no direct evidence and the entire case is based on the
G circumstantial evidence. Since this is a case of circumstantial
  evidence, the prosecution can only succeed in proving the guilt
  b¥ the appellant by showing that there is no gap in the chain of
  circumstances proved by it.
H         7. We take up for consideration the last submission made
      · SHANMUGHAN v. STATE OF KERALA                      417
           [ASOK KUMAR GANGULY, J.)
by the learned counsel for the appellant. We are inclined to A
agree that when a case is sought to be proved by the
prosecution on the basis of circumstantial evidence, the burden
on the prosecution is that it must prove each circumstance in
such a way as to complete the chain and at the same time it
should be consistent with the guilt of the accused. Any B
reasonable doubt in proving the circumstances must be
resolved in favour of the accused. The accused must be given
the benefit of any fact or circumstance which is consisted with
his innocence, which is to be presumed, unless the contrary is
proved by chain of circumstances.                               C

     8. If we go to the aforesaid principle, we find that in the
instant case, the prosecution has succeeded in proving the
motive of the appellant and the entire chain of circumstances
is consistent with the guilt of the appellant.                     0
     9. On the fateful night, admittedly nobody was present in
the bed room where the appellant and the deceased were
sleeping as husband and wife. The victim admitted!y screamed
at about 2 a.m. This attracted the inmates of the house to rush
to the bed room to find the victim dead as a result of             E
administering of poison. This is not in dispute.

     10. The only dispute is who administered the poison, and
whether it was a case of suicidal poisoning or homicidal
poisoning. The injuries which have been found on the deceased F
by PW 7 are very vital to answer this question. It is the case of
the prosecution that the victim died of cyanide poison which is
a highly corrosive poison and is obtained by distilling potassium
cyanide or potassium ferrocyanide with dilute sulphuric acid.
[See: Modi, a textbook of Medical Jurisprudence and G
Toxicology 24th Edition Year 2011 Page 260, Chapter 12,
Section 2]. As a result of administering such corrosive poison,
there is bound to be local and chemical action of corroding and
destroying all tissues which come in contact with it. [See: Modi
(supra) page 31, Chapter 2, Section 2)                            H
    418      SUPREME COURT REPORTS                [2012) 1 S.C.R.

A         11. The post mortem examination in cases of death by
    administering such corrosive poison, would show that the mouth,
    lips, skin and mucous membrane are corroded in patches and
    in acute cases, the same may be charred.(See: Modi (supra)
    pages 33-37, Chapter 2, Section 2).
B
        12. In this case, we find from the injuries discussed above
  that there is presence of lacerated wounds on the lips,
  contusions in the ear and abrasions in the chest. These injuries
  clearly show that some force was used while administering the
C poison. Without any force these injuries could not be there in a
  case of suicidal poison. Apart from the appellant no one was
  there in bed room to apply force on the victim. That apart the -
  evidence of PW 7 also shows that all the injuries were fresh
  injuries and cannot be sustained by fall on a hard substance.
0 PW 7 also deposed that the injuries could be because of
  forcible administration of poison. Thus the prosecution has
  rightly proved that it is a case of murder and there is no reason
  for our interference.

       13. On the next point urged by the learned counsel that as
E the prosecution has failed to prove that the appellant had the
  possession of poison, the prosecution's case will be vitiated,
  we are not accepting the aforesaid proposition. However, in
  support of the aforesaid submission, learned counsel for the
  appellant relied upon a three Judge Bench decision of this Court
F in the case of Sharad Birdhichand Sarda vs. State of
  Maharashtra reported in (1984) 4 SCC 116 and the learned
  counsel relied upon paragraph 165 at page 188 of the judgment
  where Justice Fazal Ali, J. formulated certain propositions to
  indicate that in a case relating to murder by poison, four
G important circumstances can justify a conviction and His
  Lordship laid down the following principles:
          "1. there is a clear motive for an accused to administer
          poison to the deceased,
H
       SHANMUGHAN v. STATE OF KERALA                       419
          [ASOK KUMAR GANGULY, J.]
    2 that the deceased died of poison said to have been · A
    administered,
    3. that the accused had the poison in his possession,
    4. that he had an opportunity to administer the poison to
    the deceased"                                                  B
      14. We have gone through the said judgment carefully. We
find that in the said case, the learned Judges gave the accused
the benefit of doubt in view of the last seen theory.
     15. Here the facts are much more loaded against the C
appellant. In this case, the appellant and the deceased were
admittedly sleeping together at the night-of occurrence inside
a bed room and no third person was there and administration
of poison took place inside the bed room. However, it appears
that on those principles which have been formulated by Justice D
Fazal Ali, some doubts were expressed both by Justice
Varadarajan and Justice Mukharji, JJ (as His Lordship then was)
in paragraphs 199 and 204 of the Judgment. However, the
learned Judges agreed with the conclusions reached by Justice
Fazal Ali.                                                      E
      16. Another three Judge Bench of this Court in a matter
relating to murder by poisoning gave a unanimous verdict
formulating different principles. In the case of Anant Chintaman
Lagu vs. The State of Bombay reported in AIR 1960 SC 500,          F
Justice Hidayatullah (as His Lordship then was) elaborated
these principles succinctly in paragraph 58 of the judgment. His
Lordship referred to three principles which are necessary to
prove in order to return a conviction in a case of murder by
poisoning. Those principles are as follows:
                                                                   G
     a. That death took place by poisoning.
     b. That the accused had the poison in his possession and.
     c. That the accused had an opportunity to administer the
     poison to the deceased.                                       H
    420      SUPREME COURT REPORTS                   [2012] 1 S.C.R.


A      17. At page 520 of report, in paragraph 59, the Learned
  Judge clarified those principles by saying that "three
  propositions must be kept in mind always, the sufficiency of
  the evidence direct or circumstantial, to establish murder by
  poisoning will depend on the facts of each case''. His Lordship
B further clarified by saying "If circumstantial evidence, in the
  absence of direct proof of the three elements, is so decisive
  that the Court can unhesitatingly hold that the death was a
  result of administration of poison and that the poison must
  have been administered by the accused persons, then the
C conviction can be rested on it".
       18. In the instant case, there was no third person in the bed
  room and there are clear injuries on the deceased, which cannot
  be self inflicted. Therefore, poison could only be administered
0 by the accused - appellant.
         19. Reference in this connection can also be made to other
    judgments of this Court where this Court has taken a view which
    is consistent with the view taken by the unanimous three Judge
    Bench of this Court in Anant Chintaman Lagu (supra).
E
         20. In Bhupinder Singh vs. State of Punjab reported in
    (1988) 3 sec 513, this question has been fully answered by
    this Court in paragraph 25 which reads thus:

        "We do not consider thaf there should be acquittal or the
F
        failure of the prosecution to prove the possession of poison
        with the accused. Murder by poison is invariably committed
        under the cover and cloak of secrecy. Nobody will
        administer poison to another in the presence of others. The
        person who administers poison to another in secrecy will
G
        not keep a portion of it for the invest:gating officer to come
        and collect it. The person who commits such murder would
        naturally take care to eliminate and destroy the evidence
        against him. In such cases, it.would be impossible for the
        prosecution to prove possession of poison with the
H
          SHANMUGHAN v. STATE OF KERALA                          421
             [ASOK KUMAR GANGULY, J.]
       accused. The prosecution may, however, establish other            A
       circumstances consistent only with the hypothesis of the
       guilt of the accused. The court then would not be justified
       in acquitting the accused on the ground that the
       prosecution has failed to prove possession of the poison
       with the accused".                                                B

     21. Similarly, in a subsequent decision of this Court in the
case of Nirma/a Devi vs. State of J & K (1994) 1 SCC 394,
this Court again affirmed the aforesaid principles in paragraph
7 by holding as follows:
                                                                         c
              "........Yet another submission of the learned Counsel
       is that the prosecution has not established as to how the
       appellant came into possession of arsenic poison. We are
       of the view that this by itself does not affect the prosecution
       case when the other evidence is clinching".                       D

     22. In the instant case, at the time of his statement under
Section 313 Cr.P.C also, the attention of the accused -
appellant was specifically drawn by the trial court to the injuries
on the deceased. To that the appellant did not give any answer.          E

      23. Therefore, taking all these facts and also the concurrent
findings of the two courts, we are not inclined to interfere in this
appeal. The appeal is accordingly dismissed. The appellant is
to serve out the remaining sentence.
                                                                         F
N.J.                                            Appeal dismissed.