GOPALAKRISHNA TAMADA, J.

( 1 ) THE sole accused, who was tried in Sessions case No. 124 of 2002 on the file of the court of III Additional Sessions Judge, Fast track Court, Cuddapah, for the offences punishable under Sections 302, 182, 194 and 211. P. C. , is the appellant in Crl. Appeal no. 1290 of 2002. The learned Sessions judge having held the appellant guilty of the charges levelled against him sentenced him to suffer the extreme penalty of death for the offence punishable under section 302. P. C. He also convicted the appellant for the offence punishable under section 194. P. C. and sentenced him to undergo rigorous imprisonment for two years. The learned Sessions Judge also convicted the appellant for the offence punishable under Section 211. P. C. and sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for two years. He ordered that all the sentences should run concurrently. The record has been transmitted to this Court for confirmation of the death sentence imposed against the accused as required under Section 366 cr. P. C. Hence, the Referred Trial. As the referred trial and the Criminal Appeal arose out of one and the same Sessions Case, they are disposed of by this common judgment.

( 2 ) THE substance of the charge against the appellant herein is that on the intervening night of 11/12-9-2001, the appellant committed the murder of his own daughter by name Prasanna, aged about 3 years, and gave false information to the police as if one D. Suryanarayana (who is examined as p. W. 7) committed the said offence.

( 3 ) THE case of the prosecution is that the appellant herein is also an accused in another Sessions Case. i.e., S. C. No. 363/1999 wherein the said D. Suryanarayana (P. W. 7) is one of the witnesses. Although the appellant tried for compromise, as P. W. 7 did not agree for the same, the appellant bore grudge against him and was waiting for an opportunity to wreak vengeance against him. Be that as it may, on the intervening night of 11/12-9-2001. i.e., in the wee hours of 12-9-2001, the appellant took the deceased to the bushes situated on eastern side of the road near Maddimadugu village and murdered her by inflicting multiple injuries with a sickle on her head. Subsequently, he placed a notebook (M. O. 2), pancha (M. O. 3) and a photograph of P. W. 7 (M. O. 1) near the dead body of the deceased to create an impression as if p. W. 7 committed the said offence. In the morning. i.e., on 13-9-2001, the appellant along with one M. Purushottam Reddy, the landlord under whom the appellant was working as a farm servant (examined as p. W. 2), came to C. K. Dinne Police Station at about 12. 30 p. m., and submitted a report (Ex. P-1).

( 4 ) IN Ex. P-1-report it was alleged that the daughter of the accused was kidnapped by P. W. 7. The S.I. of Police, c. K. Dinne Police Station (examined as P. W. II) registered the same as F.I.R. (Ex. P- 7) and sent copies of the same to all the concerned. On the same day in the evening, the appellant again went to the Police Station along with P. W. 2 and informed the police that the dead body of the deceased was traced and that he was suspecting the involvement of P. W. 7. Basing on the said report, the S.I. of Police (P. W. II) altered the F.I.R. and the altered F.I.R. is Ex. P-17. M. Os. l to 3 were seized under Ex. P-8 report on 13-9-2001.

( 5 ) THEREAFTER on 14-9-2001, the Inspector of Police, Cuddapah (examined as P. W. 13) took up investigation from p. W. 11 and conducted inquest over the dead body of the deceased from 7. 00 a. m. to 10. 00 a. m., in the presence of P. Ws. 8 and 9. Ex. P-4 is the inquest report. A rough sketch of the scene of offence (marked as ex. P-12) was also prepared. A readymade gown and plastic bangles were seized from the dead body of the deceased. Thereafter, the body of the deceased was sent for post mortem examination.

( 6 ) THE Civil Assistant Surgeon, Government Hospital, Cuddapah (examined as P. W. 10), conducted, post mortem examination over the dead body of the deceased on 14-9-2001 and issued post mortem certificate (Ex. P-5 ). According to ex. P-5, two injuries are found on the dead body of the deceased. P. W. 10 opined that the deceased would appear to have died due to head injury.

( 7 ) SUBSEQUENTLY, when P. W. 2 (the master of the appellant) informed the appellant that the police were suspecting the appellant as an accused in the murder of his daughter and asked him to inform the same to the Village Administrative officer (examined as P. W. 3), the appellant went to P. W. 3 on 19-9-2001 and made an extra-judicial confession before P. W. 3 stating that he killed the deceased on account of the grudge which he was having against p. W. 7 to see that P. W. 7 is arrested for the murder of his daughter. It is the further case of the prosecution that the appellant further stated that he killed his own daughter. i.e., the deceased, and made allegations against P. W. 7 so that P. W. 7 would not give evidence against him in the murder case of one Kondaiah and that P. W. 7 would come for a compromise. According to the extra-judicial confession made by the appellant herein, he alone kept the notebook, photograph of P. W. 7 and the pancha (M. Os. l to 3) by the side of the dead body of the deceased. The said extra-judicial confession allegedly made by the appellant was reduced into writing by P. W. 3 in the presence of P. W. 12. Later, all of them went and gave a report to police. The said extra-judicial confession alleged to have been made by the appellant is marked as ex. P-2.

( 8 ) PURSUANT to the same, the Inspector of Police (P. W. 13) recorded the confession statement of the appellant and the same is marked as Ex. P-9. Pursuant to the confession made before P. W. 13, one white pancha belonging to the appellant and the crime weapon. i.e., sickle were recovered and those two are marked as M. Os. 5 and 4 respectively. The said recovery was done in the presence of P. Ws. 3 and 12 and the seizure report is Ex. P-11. The Inspector of police (P. W. 13) examined P. Ws. 3, 12 and 4 on the same day. i.e., on 19-9-2001 and p. W. 7 on 20-9-2001. All the Material objects. i.e., M. Os.1 to 5 were sent to Forensic science Laboratory and on receipt of report (Ex. P-17) from the Forensic Science laboratory, a charge sheet is filed against the appellant or 20-12-2001.

( 9 ) IN support of its case, the prosecution examined P. Ws. l to 13 and got marked Exs. P-1 to P-19 and also M. Os. l to 5. During the course of examination under Section 313 Cr. P. C. , the appellant pleaded not guilty. Basing on the evidence of P. Ws. 2, 3 and 12 coupled with the extra- judicial confession alleged to have been made by the appellant herein (Ex. P-2), the learned Sessions Judge held that the prosecution has proved the guilt of the appellant herein beyond all reasonable doubt and accordingly convicted and sentenced the appellant as stated supra.

( 10 ) LEARNED Counsel for the appellant mainly contended before this Court that the evidence relied upon by the prosecution does not inspire any confidence that the appellant alone is responsible for the murder of the deceased. According to him, the entire case rests on circumstantial evidence as there are no direct witnesses to the offence and as there are several links that are missing in the chain of events, it is rot safe to convict the appellant for the offence punishable under Section 302. P. C. According to the learned Counsel, Ex. P-2 i.e. , the extra-judicial confession which is supposed to have been made by the appellant is a weak piece of evidence and without there being any independent corroboration, it is not safe to rely upon the said extra-judicial confession to hold that the appellant committed the offence. He lastly submitted that even if the entire case of the prosecution is held to be proved, it is not one of the rarest of the rarest cases where capital punishment should be imposed.

( 11 ) ON the other hand, the learned Public Prosecutor submitted that the extra- judicial confession made by the appellant is voluntary and that no force from any quarter, especially the police, was ever applied to the appellant to make the said confession. It is, therefore, contended that as the appellant gave the said confessional statement voluntarily and on his own free volition, such a statement can be accepted by the Court irrespective of the fact whether there is corroboration to it or not. In this case, according to the learned Public prosecutor, the said confession was made by the appellant to P. W. 3 in the presence of p. W. 12 and immediately thereafter all the three persons. i.e., Appellant, P. Ws. 3 and 12 went to the Police Station and the Inspector of Police (P. W. 13) basing on the said confession of the appellant, arrested the appellant on 19-9-2001. According to him, ex. P-2 does not suffer from any infirmity and the Court below is perfectly justified in accepting the same in finding the appellant guilty of the offences with which he is charged. According to him, in the light of the said extra-judicial confession of the appellant and also in view of the fact that the appellant killed his own daughter, who was aged about 3 years, this case can be definitely stated to be one of the rarest of the rare cases where capital punishment can be awarded.

( 12 ) IN the light of the above submissions made by both the Counsel, the question that falls for consideration is whether the death of the deceased is homicidal or not and if so whether the appellant has committed the act of murder. e. , killing the deceased as alleged by the prosecution.

( 13 ) FROM a reading of the post mortem certificate (Ex. P-5) and the inquest report (Ex. P-4) coupled with the evidence of the inquest panchayatdars (examined as p. Ws. 5 and 6) and the Medical Officer (P. W. 10), this Court has no hesitation to hold that the deceased died of homicidal death.

( 14 ) THE next question is whether the accused is responsible for the said death of the deceased. In order to prove the same, the prosecution examined as many as 13 witnesses but none of them are direct witnesses. The entire case of the prosecution rests solely on circumstantial evidence. In a case of murder in which the evidence is of a circumstantial nature, the facts and circumstances from which the conclusion of guilt is said to be drawn by the prosecution must be fully established beyond all reasonable doubt. The facts and circumstances so established should not only be consistent with the guilt of the accused but also they must entirely be incompatible with the innocence of the accused and must exclude every reasonable hypothesis consistent with his innocence.

( 15 ) THEREFORE, this Court has to see whether all the circumstances in the chain of events pointing to the guilt of the accused are perfectly connected or not. The first and the most important link which is sought to be relied upon by the prosecution in this case is the extra-judicial confession (Ex. P-2) alleged to have been made by the accused to P. W. 3 in the presence of p. W. 12. The question is whether the said extra-judicial confession which is allegedly made by the accused forms the basis of conviction. No doubt, the evidence of extra- judicial confession in the very nature of things is a weak piece of evidence. Therefore, the Court must take every caution while appreciating such evidence. The value of the evidence as to extra-judicial confession like other evidence depends on veracity, reliability and truthfulness of the witnesses before whom it had been made. The evidence of the witnesses who speak about the extra-judicial confession must be unambiguous and unmistakably convey that the accused is the perpetrator of the crime. Besides the confession, there must also be independent evidence which must unmistakably point to the guilt of the accused. Above all, in order that the extra-judicial confession can be used to base conviction, it must withstand two tests (1) whether it was really made; (2) is it voluntary and true. If the two tests are satisfied that the extra- judicial confession was really made and it was voluntary, conviction can safely be based on such extra-judicial confession. Having due regard to the above legal position on the point, we shall now proceed to deal with the evidence which is adduced by the prosecution in this regard.

( 16 ) AS already stated, P. W. 3 is the person who spoke about the said extra- judicial confession allegedly made by the appellant. He is a crucial witness in this case. By the date of offence, P. W. 3 was working as Village Administrative Officer of Chinnakampalli Village. He deposed in his evidence that he knows the appellant. On 19-9-2001, the appellant came to him and stated that as per the directions of p. W. 2. i.e., the master of the appellant, he came to P. W. 3 to inform that he (appellant) killed his daughter. But according to Ex. P-2- statement which is alleged to have been written by P. W. 3 as per the narration of the appellant, P. W. 3 does not know the appellant and the narration is made to p. W. 3 at the instance of P. W. 2. Thus, as per the Ex. P-2-statement recorded by P. W. 3, which was written at the earliest point of time, P. W. 3 is a total stranger to the appellant and if really the accused wanted to confess about the alleged offence, there was no need for him to go to a stranger like P. W. 3 and make a statement as alleged, particularly when a person like P. W. 2, under whom the appellant was working, was very much available in the village. Even the normal conduct of any person who is placed in such a situation would be to go to a person who is very well known to him and make any such extra-judicial confession but not to a person who is altogether stranger to him. In a recent judgment of this Court in v. Rajendra Reddy v. State of A. P. , 2002 (2) ls 338, a Division Bench of this Court after considering the entire case law on the subject held that when there is no acquaintance between the accused and the person before whom he makes a confession and when it is made after lapse of time, it is highly unsafe to believe the testimony of such a witness and in case of such, the extra-judicial confession has to be rejected. In the instant case also, as already observed by us, P. W. 2 is a person under whom the accused was working as a farm servant. It is only on information through P. W. 2 that the police are suspecting the appellant, and the appellant instead of making a confession before P. W. 2, makes the same before P. W. 3 who is a total stranger. This circumstance of making extra-judicial confession before P. W. 3 throws any amount of doubt. No doubt it is true that the alleged extra-judicial confession is corroborated by the evidence of P. W. 12 on some material particulars but his evidence also does not inspire any confidence for various reasons. P. W. 3, who is scribe of ex P-2-confession statement, does not give the descriptive particulars as to how the appellant narrated the events; but curiously p. W. 12 narrates each and every minute detail. According to P. W. 3, the appellant informed him that he killed his daughter. i.e., the deceased whereas P. W. 12 states that the appellant informed the P. W. 3 that he cut the neck of his daughter with a sickle. In Ex. P-2, it is mentioned that all the three persons. i.e., P. Ws. 3, 12 and the appellant went to Chintakomma Dinne Police Station where Ex. P-2 was reduced to writing and the same was handed over to the police; but in the evidence of P. Ws. 3 and 12, it is stated that the confession statement made by the appellant was reduced to writing at Chinnakampalli Village and after obtaining his thumb mark, all of them proceeded to the Police Station and handed over Ex. P-2 to the police. All these material discrepancies and variations in the evidence of prosecution witnesses improbablises the story put forth by the prosecution basing on the extra-judicial confession.

( 17 ) ANOTHER important aspect which throws suspicion in the case of the prosecution is the prosecution witnesses going to the Inspector of Police (P. W. 13) at Cuddapah. It is in the evidence of P. W. 12 that one has to go to Cuddapah only via c. K. Dinne Police Station which is by the side of the road. While so on 13-9-2001, the appellant gave a report at C. K. Dinne police station pursuant to which the criminal law was set in motion. Subsequently when an extra-judicial confession was made by the appellant, instead of going to the very same C. K. Dinne Police Station where report was initially given, P. Ws. 3 and 12 have curiously chosen to go to Cuddapah and report the matter to the Inspector of Police (P. W. 13). On coming to know that P. W. 13 was not there in Cuddapah, then they went to C. K. Dinne Police Station where they noticed P. W. 13 and then they informed him about the alleged extra-judicial confession of the appellant. The theory of the prosecution in this regard appears to be highly unnatural. The normal conduct of any person in such situations would be to first go to the Police Station where the report is initially lodged and inform the police there about any information which is known to them. But in this case, it was not so. No explanation is also forthcoming in the instant case as to what prompted p. Ws. 3 and 12 to go to Cuddapah at the first instance and later to C. K. Dinne Police station. Therefore, the veracity of PWs. 3 and 12, in the absence of any plausible explanation in this regard, appears to be highly doubtful.

( 18 ) ANOTHER circumstance which improbablises the story of the prosecution is the medical evidence. M. Os. 4 and 5 are the recoveries made under Section 27 of the Evidence Act in the presence of the accused. Even if the alleged recoveries are accepted, the medical evidence let in by the prosecution does not corroborate the same. According to the extra-judicial confession which is alleged to have been made by the accused, the accused killed the deceased with a sickle. The recovered article. i.e., M. O. 5 also is a sickle. However, the Doctor who conducted post mortem examination over the dead body of the deceased (examined as P. W. 10) stated that the deceased died about two to three days prior to the post mortem examination due to heavy cutting with machu kathi he further deposed in his evidence that injury No. 1 is not possible with a sickle; that there is a difference between a sickle and a machu kathi and that the sickle is a light weapon. Thus, there is serious discrepancy with regard to the weapon that was allegedly used by the accused in this case, which would improbablise the entire case of the prosecution.

( 19 ) HAVING carefully gone through the entire oral and documentary evidence adduced in this case, we are of the firm opinion that the evidence adduced by the prosecution is insufficient and suffers from serious discrepancies giving rise to lot of suspicion in the mind of the Court. The circumstantial evidence suffers from number of infirmities. The prosecution has miserably failed to connect all the links in the chain of events so as to establish the guilt of the accused beyond all reasonable doubt. The Doctor was also unable to find the cause of death. For the foregoing discussion, this Court has no hesitation to hold that the learned Sessions Judge is erred in believing such evidence and convicting the appellant for the offences with which he was charged. Therefore, the judgment of conviction and sentences passed by the Court below for the offences punishable under sections 302, 194 and 211. P. C. is liable to be set aside.

( 20 ) IN the result, the conviction and sentence of death and the sentences of imprisonment passed for the offences punishable under Sections 302, 211 and 194 IPC by the learned HI Additional Sessions judge, Fast Track Court, Cuddapah, in sessions Case No. 124 of 2002, are hereby set aside and the appellant/accused is acquitted of all the charges framed for the offences punishable under Sections 302, 194 and 211 of the Indian Penal Code. The appellant/accused shall be set at liberty forthwith if he is not required in any other case.

( 21 ) THE Appeal allowed and the Referred Trial is answered accordingly.