Name in suicide note not enough to convict unless other evidence suggests it's not false -P&H HC

07 May 2024 8:19 AM

By: Admin

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has declared that the mere inclusion of a name in a suicide note is insufficient to establish guilt unless other evidence shows that the attribution is accurate and free from any air of falsehood.

The appeal contesting the Additional Sessions Judge's decision in which the accused was found guilty of offences punishable under Sections 306 and 34 of the IPC was being heard by the Justice Sureshwar Thakur bench.

In this instance, Punjab National Bank had granted the complainant's father Satbir (now deceased) a CC Limit of Rs. 75.0 lacs. The second accused, Sharwan Kumar, was acting as a middleman, and with the help of the third accused who was found not guilty, his father was able to get a CC Limit facility from the bank.

A case was filed against Pardeep Sharma, the owner of M/s Shyam Trading Company, at the Punjab National Bank's Mall Road Branch in Delhi for obtaining a loan through forgery. The investigating officer informed them that his father Satbir's signatures were attached to the loan documents.

Even though his signature appears on the loan documents for the company M/s Shyam Trading Company, his father Satbir stated that he does not know Pardeep Sharma. The acquitted accused Sharwan Kumar and Ravi Bharti (duo) further informed him that Pardeep Sharma is their relative and that he had added these signatures at their request.

The complainant and his father saw the pair as a result, but they refused to provide them any information about Pardeep Sharma instead saying that since Satbir's signature was on the paperwork, they should now face the consequences and that they wouldn't reveal anything else.

Due to pressure from the exonerated defendants Sharwan Kumar, Ravi Bharti, and Pardeep Sharma, his father ingested poison.

During the inquiry, the police also found a suicide note in which Satbir mentioned Ravi Bharti and cleared the suspects of being the ones to blame for his passing. The duo had lured Satbir into a trap, and as a result, he had ingested the poison, as was made obvious in the suicide note. On the bottom of the suicide note, Satbir also signed his name.

The bench was asked to consider the following:

The High Court stated that if the contents of the suicide note or dying declaration are shown to not have been written by the deceased or if the signatures on the document are determined by the Handwriting Expert concerned to not belong to the deceased, then the evidence is prima-facie strong and falls under the purview of Section 32 of the Indian Evidence Act.

The bench ruled that the report of the Handwriting Expert concerned may only be used as evidence if it has been admitted or standard writings of the deceased or of the person in question have been produced alongside the contested writings by the investigating officer.

According to the High Court, "the attributions of inculpations, in the purported dying declaration concerned, as purportedly authored by the deceased concerned, and as appertaining to the maker's committing suicide and becoming instigated by any purported potent instigatory actus-reus of the offender(s) concerned, cannot per se be believed, unless all the surrounding circumstances and other evidence also suggests that such attribution, is truth."

Given the foregoing, the bench granted the appeal.

Ravi Bharti

State of Haryana