Supreme Court of India
Chabi Karmakar vs The State Of West Bengal on 29 August, 2024
Author: Sudhanshu Dhulia
Bench: Sudhanshu Dhulia
REPORTABLE
2024 INSC 665 IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION
CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 1556 OF 2013
CHABI KARMAKAR & ORS. .....Appellant(s)
Vs.
THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL .....Respondent(s)
O R D E R
1. The appellants have been convicted under Sections 498A, 304B
and 306 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code. The Trial
Court had convicted sister-in-law (appellant no.1), husband
(appellant no.2) and mother-in-law of the deceased and sentenced
them to suffer life imprisonment, 3 years R.I and 10 years R.I
for offences under Sections 304B, 498A and 306 of IPC
respectively, along with fine and other default stipulations.
Both the conviction and the sentence of the present appellants
have been upheld in appeal and the High Court has dismissed the
appeal. During the pendency of the appeal, one of the appellants
i.e. appellant no. 3 (Sova Rani Karmakar, the mother-in-law of
the deceased) had passed away and the case against her stands
abated.
2. The brief case of the prosecution is as follows:
Signature Not Verified
Digitally signed by
Nirmala Negi
Date: 2024.09.07
14:06:06 IST
The deceased, Sonali Karmakar, and the appellant No. 2,
Reason:Samir Karmarkar were married in March 2003, and out of the
wedlock, there is a son who was born on 4.9.2004 (Now 20 years of
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age). On 2.5.2006 the deceased committed suicide by hangingherself in her matrimonial house. The deceased was alone at the
time of the incident and the appellant No. 2, the husband was not
even in the house at the time of the incident. The appellant no.
2 was informed and the deceased had been taken to the
Krishnanagar hospital where she was declared dead. An inquest
report was conducted at the hospital and a post-mortem was
conducted on 03.05.2006 by Dr. Ajit Kumar Biswas (PW-15). Post-
mortem report shows that there were ligature marks around the
neck of the deceased and the nature of the ligature marks shows
that it is a case of suicide. Apart from the ligature marks,
there were no other ante-mortem injuries on the body of the
deceased. The report also showed that the deceased was 22 years
of age at the time of her death.
An FIR was lodged by the brother of the deceased at
Krishnaganj Police Station, Nadia on 07.05.2006 i.e. after 5 days
of the incident, alleging that his sister i.e. the deceased was
being harassed by her in-laws on demand of dowry made prior to
her death. A case was registered under sections 498A/304B/34 and
a chargesheet was filed. Thereafter, Trial Court vide order and
judgment dated 5.6.2009 convicted the present appellants and
mother-in-law under Sections 498A, 304B, 306 read with Section 34
of the Indian Penal Code. The case of the prosecution is that
there was a harassment of deceased which was connected to the
demand of dowry, which led the deceased to commit suicide.
3. Prosecution witnesses PW-1, 3 and 16 have all deposed that
there was a demand of dowry about which they were informed when
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the deceased had come to her maternal house soon before her
death. The learned counsel for the State would argue that there
is evidence in the form of PW-4 that appellant no. 2 was also
having an extramarital affair with another woman which led to
frequent discord between the deceased and appellant no. 2 and
this was another cause of her harassment.
The learned counsel for the appellants would, however, argue
that this cannot be construed as a demand for dowry and would not
come within the definition of dowry as defined under Section 2 of
the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961 which reads as under:
“Definition of ‘dowry’ – In this Act, “dowry” means
any property or valuable security given or agreed to
be given either directly or indirectly –
(a) By one party to a marriage to the other party to
the marriage; or
(b) By the parent of either party to a marriage or by
any other person, to either party to the marriage or
to any other person,
At or before [or any time after the marriage] [in
connection with the marriage of the said parties, but
does not include] dowry or mahr in the case of
persons to whom the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat)
applies.”The point which is made by learned counsel for the
appellants would be that although a demand can be made either
before or “any time after the marriage”, it should be in
connection with the marriage of the said parties. The counsel for
the appellants further argued that the demand for dowry has not
been fully established by the prosecution hence the death as
occurred on 02.05.2006 cannot be termed as a dowry death.
4. We have heard arguments and counterarguments from both
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parties and have gone through the material on record. From the
evidence which has been placed by the prosecution, there are
certain facts that have been proved beyond any doubt which are:
(i) That the deceased died within seven years
of marriage;
(ii) The death was by suicide in her matrimonial
house; and
(iii) There was harassment at the hands of her
in-laws and particularly by the husband;
(iv) And that there was marital discord between
husband and wife.
5. As far as appellant no.1 (sister-in-law of deceased) is
concerned, we are of the view that the prosecution has failed to
place any credible evidence for the involvement of appellant no.
1 i.e. the sister of appellant no. 2 and sister-in-law of the
deceased. Moreover, appellant no. 1 is a married woman and at
the relevant point of time, admittedly, she was residing with her
family at her matrimonial home. There is no specific evidence
that has come in the form of any of the prosecution witnesses
that may connect appellant no. 1 to the commission of the crime
and the trial Court as well as the appellate Court have not
considered this aspect as it should have been considered on the
weight of the evidence which was placed by the prosecution.
Now, the only question left to be determined is regarding the
guilt of appellant no.2 (husband).
6. After going through the evidence of PW-1, PW-3, PW-4 and P-
16 (who are the brother, father, mother and cousin of the
deceased respectively), it becomes clear that the deceased faced
cruelty and harassment at the hands of her husband (appellant
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no.2) which compelled her to commit suicide. However, these
witnesses did not state that such cruelty and harassment was in
connection with the demand for dowry. With respect to the demand
for dowry, they have just made some general statements which are
not sufficient to convict the appellants under section 304B of
IPC.
7. Trial Court raised a presumption under section 113B of
Evidence Act to convict the appellants under section 304B of IPC.
The High Court did not go into the question of whether the trial
court was right in relying upon section 113B of the Evidence Act.
In Charan Singh alias Charanjit Singh vs. State of
Uttarakhand 2023 SCC OnLine SC 454, where there were allegations
against the husband that he was subjecting the deceased therein
on the demand of a motorcycle and some land, this Court in
relation to Section 113B of Evidence Act and section 304B of IPC,
had noted that:
“21…………………It is only certain oral averments regarding
demand of motorcycle and land which is also much prior
to the incident. The aforesaid evidence led by the
prosecution does not fulfil the pre-requisites to
invoke presumption under Section 304B IPC or Section
113B of the Indian Evidence Act……
22.XXXXXXX
23. On a collective appreciation of the evidence led
by the prosecution, we are of the considered view that
the prerequisites to raise presumption under Section
304B and Section 113B of the Indian Evidence Act
having not being fulfilled, the conviction of the
appellant cannot be justified. Mere death of the
deceased being unnatural in the matrimonial home
within seven years of marriage will not be sufficient
to convict the accused under Section 304B and 498A of
IPC.”Similarly, in the case at hand, it has not been proved by the
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prosecution that the deceased was subjected to cruelty soonbefore her death in connection with the demand of dowry and hence
we are of the opinion that this is not a case of dowry death
under Section 304B of the Indian Penal Code. PW-1 and PW-3 had
only stated that deceased used to tell them about her torture.
PW-4 (mother of the deceased) did not speak about any demand of
dowry after marriage. Moreover, this witness had said that
appellant no.2 used to assault her deceased daughter as the
deceased had objections to the illicit relation of appellant no.2
with another woman. PW-16, who is the cousin of the deceased, had
deposed in court almost a year after the testimony of PW-1, 3 & 4
and his deposition regarding the physical assault of the deceased
in connection with the demand of dowry is also not believable.
Considering the aforesaid, in our view, the trial court erred in
raising a presumption under Section 113B of the Indian Evidence
Act, even though the demand for dowry was not established.
8. On the other hand, the learned counsel for the State of
West Bengal would rely on two judgments of this Court, seeking
appellants’ conviction under Section 304B of IPC, both of which
were decided by Three Judges’ Bench of this Court: Rajinder Singh
vs. State of Punjab (2015) 6 SCC 477 and State of Madhya Pradesh
v. Jogendra & Anr.(2022) 5 SCC 401.
The facts in Rajinder Singh (Supra) were entirely
different. In that case, the deceased had died due to consumption
of poison and there were specific allegations against in-laws in
the form of evidence from the deceased’s father, who had given
credible evidence that the in-laws were demanding money for the
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construction of the house. There was also evidence of giving a
she-buffalo to pacify the in-laws. Father of the deceased therein
further deposed how the Sarpanch and Ex-Sarpanch of their village
went to the matrimonial home of the deceased for reconciliation
where the father of deceased had promised to give money after
harvest of crops.
Jogendra (Supra) was decided by taking into account the
peculiar facts of that case where the evidence of PW-1 therein
contained specific allegations of constant demand for dowry. It
was stated that deceased was asked to raise Rs.50,000 for the
construction of house. He further stated that there was even an
attempt by the ‘people of society’ to settle the matrimonial
discord between the parties.
In paragraph 9 of Rajinder Singh (Supra), this Court had
discussed the ingredients of Section 304B of IPC as follows:
“9. The ingredients of the offence under Section 304-B
IPC have been stated and restated in many judgments.
There are four such ingredients and they are said to be:
(a) death of a woman must have been caused by any burns
or bodily injury or her death must have occurred
otherwise than under normal circumstances;
(b) such death must have occurred within seven years of
her marriage;
(c) soon before her death, she must have been subjected
to cruelty or harassment by her husband or any relative
of her husband; and
(d) such cruelty or harassment must be in connection
with the demand for dowry.”The evidence placed before us, in the case at hand, is not
sufficient to prove the fourth ingredient i.e. cruelty or
harassment in connection with the demand for dowry, as laid down
by the abovementioned case.
9. All the same, having considered all the relevant aspects of
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the matter, and the evidence of the prosecution, we are also of
the opinion that a case of abetment of suicide under Section 306
of IPC and cruelty under Section 498A of IPC is made out against
the appellant No. 2, although the offence under Section 304B is
not made out and consequently, we set aside the conviction of
appellant no.2 under Section 304B of IPC. With respect to the
offences under Section 306 and 498A, we convict the appellant No.
2 and sentence him to undergo three years of rigorous
imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 25000/- on each count. Both the
sentences shall run concurrently and in default of fine, he shall
undergo further imprisonment of 3 months. Further, we direct
that the fine payable shall be paid to the nearest relative of
the deceased within a period of 3 months from today. The
appellant no.2 shall surrender before the concerned Court within
four weeks from today and undergo the remaining sentence.
Also, we allow the appeal with respect to appellant no. 1
by acquitting her for all offences in present case. As she is
presently on bail, so she need not surrender.
The Appeal is disposed of accordingly.
Pending application(s), if any, shall stand(s) disposed of.
………………..J
.
(SUDHANSHU DHULIA)
………………..J
.
(J.B. PARDIWALA)
New Delhi;
August 29, 2024
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