High Court allows appeals in dowry death case

The Delhi High Court has allowed three separate appeals by the husband, mother-in-law and brother-in-law of a woman in a dowry death case, saying that the four dying declarations recorded by the woman were inconsistent.

The trial court had convicted the three, Manoj, husband of the woman, her mother-in-law Bisno and brother-in-law Sanjay on the basis of the dying declarations accusing them of subjecting her to cruelty for dowry.

The prosecution in the trial court as well as in the High Court had relied solely on the dying declarations of the victim, Sunita, to prove the case against the accused persons.

In her dying declarations, the woman had charged the accused persons of harassing her and subjecting her to cruelty. They would taunt her for bringing insufficient dowry and pressurise her to get goods from her parents.

On the fateful day, she was at home with her husband as her mother-in-law and father-in-law had gone out for some work. When her husband threatened to kill her during a quarrel, she poured kerosene and set herself on fire.

She later succumbed to her injuries at a hospital after recording her dying declarations.

However, two of the four dying declarations - one given to the SDM and the other to investigating officer - put paid to the prosecution case.

In her statement to the SDM, the woman said her mother-in-law and father-in-law and brother-in-law were at home when she set herself afire on being threatened by her husband, while in the other statement she said that only she and her husband were present at their residence.

Though the prosecution tried to save it by arguing that the charge of subjecting her to cruelty was common in all her dying declarations but Justice Ajit Bharihoke dismissed it.

The prosecution also lost the case as it did not bother to call in the witness box the doctor who had prepared the medico-legal case as well as recorded the first of the four dying declarations of the victim and the parents of the victim.

Allowing the appeals, Justice Bharihoke said: “Under the circumstances, I find it difficult to sustain the conviction of the appellants on the aforesaid counts, based upon uncorroborated dying declarations of the deceased which are inconsistent with each other.''