Supreme Court acquits man in 1997 murder case

The Supreme Court on Thursday acquitted a man who had been convicted and sentenced to life for a murder which took place in 1997 [Kirpal Singh vs State of Punjab]..A bench of Justices BR Gavai and Sandeep Mehta held that apart from two unreliable witnesses, no other tangible evidence was led by the prosecution to connect the accused with the crime."We are of the firm opinion that both these witnesses fall in the second category, i.e., wholly unreliable. No other tangible evidence was led by the prosecution to connect the accused appellant with the crime ... the prosecution’s story of motive is very weak and rather far fetched," the apex court said..The Court was hearing an appeal against a February 2008 Punjab and Haryana High Court ruling.The High Court had confirmed the conviction and sentence imposed on the man by the trial court in July 2003.The incident took place in Punjab's Hoshiapur district. .The Supreme Court in its decision noted that a Deputy Inspector General Rank officer had revealed in his cross-examination that he found the accused to be innocent during the probe.Further, the murder weapon was not recovered from the appellant."There is no corroborative evidence so as to lend credence to the wavering and unreliable testimony of [2 prosecution witnesses] ... no corroborative evidence was led by the prosecution so as to lend credence to the testimony of these two witnesses," the top court observed..The appeal was allowed and the conviction of the appellant was set aside."The appellant deserves to be acquitted by giving him the benefit of doubt ... he is on bail. He need not surrender and the bail bonds are discharged," the Court ordered..Advocate Vineet Jhanji appeared for the accused, Kirpal Singh. Advocate Siddhant Sharma appeared for the State of Punjab..[Read Judgment]