HC sets aside trial court order awarding life sentence to 22

Charges against four accused upheld

CHANDIGARH: THE Punjab and Haryana high court has set aside the order of an Amritsar court awarding life sentence to 22 persons in a July 2007 double murder case. However, it upheld the life sentence punishment against four persons in the case.

However, some of them have been held guilty of other offences.

Two brothers — Sarup Singh and Kewal Singh — were killed in a clash that took place on July 10, 2007 between two groups at Dhariwal village that falls under the jurisdiction of the Raja Sansi police station in Amritsar district,

TWO BROTHERS, SARUP SINGH AND KEWAL SINGH, WERE KILLED IN A CLASH THAT TOOK PLACE ON JULY 10, 2007 BETWEEN TWO GROUPS AT DHARIWAL VILLAGE THAT FALLS UNDER THE JURISDICTION OF THE RAJA SANSI POLICE STATION IN AMRITSAR DISTRICT, SIX PERSONS WERE ALSO HURT

in which six more persons were injured. The clash took place over a property dispute. The two had sustained injuries in firing.

Four persons against whom the trial court order has been upheld are Sukhjinder Singh Jarnail Singh, Harbans Singh and Ranbir Singh. It was on November 30, 2012 that a trial court had awarded life sentence to 26 persons. The police had named 27 people as accused in the case.

The high court found that the four accused were those who had actually fired gunshots at the deceased.

There is no evidence that the other accused had caused any fatal injury leading to the death of the two brothers, the court observed.

The appellants had alleged that due to a political rivalry in the village, the police allowed the fabrication of evidence in order to name the maximum number of people as accused.

“Merely because two murders were committed and the accused persons were together with weapons, the trial court has come to conclusion that there was an unlawful assembly for the commission of offence of murders and therefore all the accused, who were present were held guilty of offence of murder (sic),” the high court said.