Conviction Cannot Stand On Contradictory Police Testimony Without Medical Evidence: Calcutta High Court Acquits Accused In 1993 Rioting Case

“Independent Witnesses Turn Hostile, Weapons Not Produced, Injury Reports Missing – Prosecution Failed To Prove Case Beyond Reasonable Doubt”, Calcutta High Court set aside the conviction of several accused who had been found guilty by the trial court for obstructing police officials during an alleged violent mob attack in 1993.

The Single Judge Bench of Justice Prasenjit Biswas held that the prosecution case suffered from serious evidentiary gaps, material contradictions among witnesses, absence of medical evidence, and failure to produce alleged weapons. Consequently, the Court ruled that the prosecution failed to establish guilt beyond reasonable doubt, and the appellants were entitled to acquittal.

The High Court therefore allowed the appeal and set aside the conviction and sentence imposed under Section 186 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code.

Background of the Case

The case arose from an incident allegedly occurring on 9 March 1993 at around 5:30 PM at Piyasbari in Malda district, West Bengal.

According to the prosecution, the accused persons along with several others formed an unlawful assembly armed with weapons such as arrows, hasua, lathis and other dangerous instruments. The mob allegedly obstructed police officials from performing their duties and attacked them with brickbats and weapons, resulting in injuries to several police personnel including Sub-Inspector Bijoy Krishna Dey and Assistant Sub-Inspector Ananda Kumar Mondal.

Following the incident, a criminal case was registered at English Bazar Police Station under various provisions of the IPC including Sections 147, 148, 149, 186, 353 and 307.

After investigation, the police filed a charge-sheet and the trial court framed charges against the accused under Sections 148, 186/34, 353/34 and 307/34 IPC.

The Additional Sessions Judge, 5th Fast Track Court, Malda, eventually convicted the accused under Section 186 read with Section 34 IPC and sentenced them to three months’ simple imprisonment with a fine of ₹200 each.

Aggrieved by the conviction, the accused persons filed the present criminal appeal before the Calcutta High Court.

Legal Issues Before the High Court

The High Court examined whether the prosecution had successfully established that:

“the accused persons formed an unlawful assembly and obstructed public servants in discharge of their official duties.”

The Court also evaluated: “whether the prosecution evidence was reliable in light of contradictions between witnesses, absence of medical evidence, and failure to prove seizure of alleged weapons.”

Independent Witnesses Turned Hostile

The Court noted that several independent witnesses were examined by the prosecution, including PW3 Mukul Mondal, PW5 Jiten Das, PW6 Ratan Das, PW8 Niren Ghosh and PW9 Sonatan Rajak. However, these witnesses did not support the prosecution case and were declared hostile.

Despite cross-examination by the prosecution, nothing useful could be elicited from their testimony to support the allegations against the accused.

Further, two witnesses cited to prove seizure of alleged articles — PW4 Lalu Rajak and PW10 Sachindranath Mondal — also failed to support the prosecution case.

PW4 denied placing his thumb impression on the seizure list and stated that he knew nothing about the incident, while PW10 admitted that he signed the seizure list at the direction of police without knowing what articles had been seized.

The Court held that such testimony seriously undermined the evidentiary value of the seizure list and weakened the prosecution case.

Absence of Medical Evidence

The prosecution alleged that several police officers including PW14 (ASI Ananda Kumar Mondal), PW15 (Constable Jagabandhu Adhikari) and PW18 (SI Bijoy Krishna Dey) sustained injuries during the attack.

However, the High Court found that no injury reports or medical certificates were produced to prove these injuries. The prosecution merely relied on hospital admission tickets marked as Exhibit-7, which did not indicate the nature or seriousness of the injuries.

The only medical witness, PW17 Dr. Ruchira Banerjee, testified that she found only a minor abrasion on the right hand of PW18, and admitted during cross-examination that such injury could have been caused by a fall on a blunt surface.

The Court observed that the failure to produce proper medical records significantly weakened the prosecution’s claim of violent assault.

Non-Seizure and Non-Production of Alleged Weapons

The prosecution alleged that the mob was armed with weapons such as hasua, lathis, stones, arrows and bows.

However, the Court found that no such weapons were seized during investigation.

Although the Investigating Officer claimed to have seized a rifle and cartridges, these items were never produced before the trial court nor marked as material exhibits.

The Court held that this non-seizure and non-production of alleged weapons created a serious gap in the prosecution case.

It observed:

“The non-production of alleged offending weapons amounts to a material irregularity and demonstrates failure of the prosecution to establish essential aspects of its case.”

Contradictions Between Police Witnesses

The Court further noted serious contradictions among police witnesses themselves.

For instance, PW18 claimed that Constable Jagabandhu Adhikari sustained injuries, whereas PW16 (the Investigating Officer) admitted during cross-examination that PW15 did not suffer any injury from stone throwing.

Another witness PW1 admitted that he could not say whether any police officer was injured, and stated that he only “later came to learn” about injuries from others.

Additionally, PW1 disclosed that his statement had never been recorded during investigation and was being made for the first time in court, significantly diminishing its evidentiary value.

The Court observed that the testimonies of police witnesses did not form a coherent narrative and were riddled with contradictions and omissions.

After examining the entire evidence, the High Court concluded that the prosecution failed to establish the occurrence of the alleged incident beyond reasonable doubt.

The Court held that the conviction recorded by the trial court was based primarily on interested testimony of police personnel without reliable corroboration, and that such evidence could not sustain a conviction.

The Court observed: “Convictions based solely on statements of interested witnesses, when such statements are fraught with contradictions and omissions, cannot be sustained under principles of criminal law.”

Accordingly, the High Court allowed the appeal and set aside the conviction and sentence passed by the trial court.

The appellants were acquitted of all charges and discharged from their bail bonds, with directions to execute bail bonds under Section 437A CrPC / Section 483 BNSS for a period of six months.

Date of Decision: 10 March 2026