1968S3211 (PLP)

Date of hearing: 24th June 1968. FAZAL-E‑AKBAR, C. J.--‑Special leave to appeal is sought against the order of a learned Single Judge of the High Court of West Pakistan at Lahore, by which he declined to interfere with the acquittal of respondents 1 to

5. The said 5 respondents were tried under section 302 read with section 149 and section 148 of the Pakistan Penal Code for the murder of Ghulam Muhammad and rioting by the Sessions Judge, Sargodha. The prosecution case briefly was that the five accused came armed with knife, hatchet and hockey sticks. Aurangzeb inflicted a knife blow on the left flank of Ghulam Muhammad, Sher Yar gave a blow with the wrong side of the hatchet and then the other three showered on him blows with hockey sticks. The Doctor, who held post‑mortem examination, found one knife injury and four abrasions on the deceased. According to the Doctor, those four abrasions could be the result of friction caused by a fall. He, however, entertained no doubt that none of the abrasions could be the result of a hatchet blow from the wrong side or of hockey sticks. The prosecution case rested on the dying declaration of the deceased and on the evidence of four eye‑witnesses. It is thus clear that each of the eye‑witnesses gave an account of the attack on the deceased which was exaggerated and quit inconsistent with the external injuries found on the deceased by the Doctor. It is not in accordance with the recognised principle-applicable to the appreciation of evidence to ignore basic falsities that appear and to accept part of the evidence. The learned Sessions Judge has also given other cogent reasons far doubting presence of some of the witnesses. In this state of evidence, it could not be said with confidence that these five respondents were responsible for the murder of Ghulam Muhammad. Dying declaration, which was recorded after about three hours of the occurrence, also suffers from the same infirmities as the evidence of the eye‑witnesses. Suspicion that it was a tutored one cannot be ruled out. The Courts below were, therefore, justified ill giving benefit of patent doubts appearing on the face of the evidence and the dying declaration. We, accordingly, sec no ground for interference and dismiss this petition. Leave refused.