SC acquits man sentenced to death for raping, murdering minor girl

New Delhi, Dec 30 (UNI) The Supreme Court has set aside the judgment of Gujarat High Court confirming death sentence awarded to a labourer by the trial court for murdering a minor girl after raping her, on grounds of proceedural lapses.

Acquitting Babubhai Udaysinh Parmar of the charges of raping and murdering Savita on July 1,1998, a bench comprising Justices S B Sinha and Markandey Katju held that the Judicial Magistrate, who recorded Parmar's confession on September 7, 2000 after his arrest on August 12 that year, did not observe the safeguards provided under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) before recording the confession, which was the only piece of evidence against him.

The Judicial Magistrate, who recorded Parmar's statement within 15 minutes of his production in the court, without administering an oath or giving an accused any opportunity of thinking over the matter, it noted.

Parmar, who is charged in a large number of criminal cases, later retracted from his judicial confession.

''The judgment of the learned trial judge gives an impression that he proceeded on the basis that the appellant is guilty of commission of a large number of crimes. The High Court, although taking note of the proposition of law, while pointing out the corroborative piece s of evidence, reported only the evidence, brought on record, which proved the commission of offence. The purported corroborative evidence brought on record by the prosecution, and as noticed by the hgih court did not indicate that the appellant was guilty of commission of the offence. The circumstances were not such which formed links in the chain and point out only to the guilt of the accused and accused alone,'' it ruled.

''We, therefore with respect, are constrained to record disagreement with the ultimate findings of the learned Sessions Judge as also the High Court,'' it said, allowing the appeal However, the apex court noted that its judgement should not influence the ongoing trials in various other cases Parmar is charged under.

''We, however, may observe that we have only considered the merits of the present appeal. Each case against the appellant must be judged on the basis of the legal evidence brought on record. Our observations, we are sure, would not influence the learned judges' dealing with other cases involving the appellant and pending before them,'' the judgement said.

The Supreme Court also faulted the state for not providing free legal aid to Parmar despite the fact that his confession, in a large number of cases, was being recorded at the same time.

The state should not have denied legal aid to him for a period of three years, it noted.

UNI AKS/SC VD BS1855