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Gulab v. State of Uttar Pradesh

Criminal Appeal · 2021 INSC 852Decided 9 Dec 2021
Criminal Appeal No. 81 of 2021
Dr. Justice D.Y. Chandrachud · Justice A.S. Bopanna · Justice Vikram Nath

Background

In 1989, Idrish allegedly shot and killed Hanifa after the appellant, Gulab, who was armed with a lathi (stick), exhorted him to attack, declaring Hanifa an "enemy." Both were convicted of murder by a trial court in 1991; Idrish died during the appeal, but Gulab's conviction was upheld by the Allahabad High Court in 2020. Gulab challenged this before the Supreme Court, arguing the eyewitnesses were all relatives of the deceased, there was an unexplained delay in filing the FIR, the murder weapon was never recovered, and no genuine "common intention" was shown against him.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal and upheld the conviction. It held that a witness being related to the victim does not automatically make their testimony unreliable, especially where three independent eyewitnesses gave consistent accounts of the appellant's presence and his act of exhorting the shooter. The Court held that failure to recover the murder weapon or get a ballistic report is not fatal when direct eyewitness testimony is otherwise credible and consistent with the medical evidence. It further held that an exhortation to kill, made and acted upon on the spot, is enough to establish "common intention" under Section 34 IPC, without needing proof of an elaborate pre-arranged plan.

Lesson Learnt

A witness related to the victim is not automatically treated as unreliable in Indian courts: what matters is whether their account is internally consistent and credible; also, simply encouraging someone else to commit a crime at the scene can make a person equally criminally liable, even without personally striking the fatal blow.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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