PANAJI
With no eyewitnesses to support the case and a witness passing away during the trial, The Additional Sessions Court, Mapusa has acquitted a youth accused of culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
According to the case details, the accused Shyamsundar Nishad, then aged 20 years, allegedly pushed Jillani Belgaonkar in the Mapusa Municipal Market on March 25, 2018. As a result, Belgaonkar fell, hitting his head on the footpath and sustaining severe head injuries. He later succumbed to his injuries at Goa Medical College. The police charged the accused with culpable homicide under Section 304 of the IPC after which he was arrested and subsequently released three months later.
The court, while delivering the verdict, noted that the victim’s son, who was the complainant, did not support the prosecution’s case. “Although he narrated the facts regarding the incident, he did not say anything to implicate the accused. Irrespective of the above, he had not witnessed any incident so far as his father is concerned. The contents of the complaint in so far as the statements against the accused, are more of hearsay in nature,” Additional Sessions Judge-2, Mapusa Ram Subrai Prabhu Dessai observed adding, “In the complaint, it is further stated that the deceased used to drink alcohol and he had seen him moving under the influence of alcohol on several occasions.”
The court further pointed out that no eyewitness was examined by the prosecution and the only person - Premkumar Kundaikar - who could have identified the accused passed away during the proceedings.
His statement was earlier recorded under Section 164 of the CrPC.
“There is no direct or circumstantial evidence produced by the prosecution to connect the accused to the crime, and in the absence of such evidence, the accused deserves to be acquitted,” reads the order.
