Chandrapal vs. The State of Chhattisgarh (Earlier M.P.)
Background
A young woman and a young man from different castes, who were in a relationship their families opposed, went missing and were later found dead, hanging from a tree, in a decomposed state. The prosecution alleged that the appellant (the woman's uncle) and other relatives murdered the couple and staged it as a double suicide because they disapproved of the inter-caste relationship. The trial court convicted the appellant of murder and destruction of evidence; the High Court confirmed his conviction.
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court acquitted the appellant, holding that the case rested entirely on circumstantial evidence and the prosecution had failed to first establish that the deaths were homicidal at all: the post-mortem doctor himself had opined the deaths were consistent with suicide by hanging and admitted he found no signs of homicide. The Court found the two pillars of the prosecution's case legally weak: an extra-judicial confession by a co-accused (a category of evidence the Court has repeatedly held to be inherently weak unless strongly corroborated), and a "last seen together" theory based on a witness statement about an event that occurred roughly ten days before the bodies were found: too large a time gap to safely connect the appellant to the deaths. Since the chain of circumstances was neither complete nor consistent solely with guilt, the conviction could not stand.
Lesson Learnt
A criminal conviction cannot rest on weak evidence like an uncorroborated confession by a co-accused or a "last seen" claim separated from the death by a long time gap. The prosecution must first prove the death was even a homicide, and any reasonable doubt on that point must benefit the accused.