ORDER
S.K. Seth, J.
1. This is a revision by the father of the deceased/Rajkumar against the judgment of acquittal passed by the Sessions Judge, Sagar on 10-8-1991 in the
Sessions Trial No. 146/91. By the impugned judgment accused/non-applicant Nos. 1 to 4 have been acquitted of the charge under Section 302 read with Section 34 of the IPC.
2. Police, Sagar after completing the investigation of the case registered at Crime No. 126/91, charge-sheeted accused persons Dharamraj, Raju @ Rajendra, Darai @ Daryav and Uday Prakash @ Udayraj for the alleged commission of the offence punishable under Section 302 read with Section 34 of the IPC. The accused persons were alleged to have committed the murder by causing repeated knife blows on the person of the deceased/Raj-kumar.
3. Before the Sessions Judge accused/non-applicant Nos. 1 to 4 were tried for offence punishable under Section 302 read with Section 34 of the IPC for having committed murder of one Rajkumar at about 7.00 in the evening on 15-34991.
4. In the trial, accused persons abjured their guilt and pleaded false implication to the charge framed against them by the Sessions Court under Section 302 read with Section 34 of the IPC.
5. From the evidence on record it appears that the occurrence took place on 15-3-1991 at about 7.00 p.m. in the evening, when accused persons objected to playing of Tape-recorder by the deceased and started hurling abuses which led to altercation. Altercation took an ugly turn and accused have alleged to inflict knife blows to the deceased. When the crowd gathered, the accused persons ran away stating that the deceased won’t survive after having received so many stab wounds. The deceased was taken to the District Hospital, Sagar where he was declared dead on arrival by Dr. R.K. Shastri (P.W. 3) vide Ex. P- 3.
6. Dr. A.K. Verma (P.W. 16) is the Autopsy Surgeon who performed the post-mortem. As per his report (Ex. P-27) he found two incised wounds over the right side of the chest. According to the doctor the wounds were ante-mortem in nature and could be caused by sharp and pointed weapon.
7. Prosecution examined as many as 16 witnesses in support of the charge. The Trial Court on close scrutiny of evidence of the above 16 witnesses found that the solitary eye-witness account of Brijrani (P.W. 1) is highly discrepant with the medical evidence. In view of the serious infirmity in the evidence of prosecution witnesses, Trial Court found it quite unsafe to act upon prosecution evidence and, therefore, returned the verdict of not guilty against the accused persons.
8. Shri Sakle, learned Counsel for the applicant has strongly contended that the Trial Court erred in discarding the evidence of eye-witness Brijrani (P.W. 1) on flimsy and untenable grounds. According to him, for one
or the other reasons, if the State Government does not prefer appeal in such serious case, this Court has ample jurisdiction to interfere with the judgment of acquittal. It is his submission that for exercise of revisionai jurisdiction there is no limitation. He has taken us through the entire deposition of the witnesses.
9. The ambit of the power of the High Court under Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure is well established by string of decisions of Supreme Court. The High Court in its revisionai power does not ordinarily interfere with the judgment of acquittal passed by the Trial Court unless there has been manifest error of law or procedure. The interference with the order of acquittal is limited only to exceptional cases where it is found that the order under revision suffers from glaring illegality or has caused miscarriage of justice or when it is found that the Trial Court has no jurisdiction to try the case or where the Trial Court has illegally shut out the evidence which otherwise ought to have been considered or where the material evidence which clinches the issue has been overlooked. These are some of the instances where the High Court would be justified in interfering with the order of acquittal. High Court cannot convert a finding of acquittal into one of conviction. We are supported by the decisions of the Supreme Court K.C. Reddy v. State of Andhra Pradesh and Anr., reported in AIR 1962 SC 1788, Akalu Ahir v. Ramdeo Ram, (1973) 2 SCC 583 and Vimal Singh v. Khuman Singh, (1998) 7 SCC 223, and the latest decision of the Supreme Court Thankappan Nadar and Ors. v. Gopala Krishnan and Anr., (2002) 9 SCC 393.
10. In Bindeshwari Prasad Singh @ B.P. Singh and Ors. v. State of Bihar (Now Jharkhand) and Anr., reported in AIR 2002 SC 2907, it has been held as under :–
“12. We have carefully considered the material on record and we are satisfied that the High Court was not justified in re-appreciating the evidence on record and coming to a different conclusion in a revision preferred by the information under Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Sub-section (3) of Section 401 in terms provides that nothing in Section 401 shall be deemed to authorize a High Court to convert a finding of acquittal into one of conviction. The aforesaid sub-section, which places a limitation on the powers of the Revisionai Court, prohibiting it from convert a finding of acquittal into one of conviction, is itself indicative of the nature and extent of the revisionai power conferred by Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. If the High Court could not convert a finding of acquittal into one of the conviction directly, it could not do so indirectly by the method of ordering a re-trial. It is well settled by a catena of decision of this Court that the High Court will ordinarily not interfere in revision with an order, of acquittal except in exceptional, cases where the interest of public justice requires interference for the correction of a manifest illegality or the prevention of gross miscarriage of justice. The High Court will not be justified in interfering with an order of acquittal merely because the Trial Court has taken a wrong view of the law or has erred in appreciation of evidence. It is neither possible nor advisable to make an exhaustive list of circumstances in which exercise of revisional jurisdiction may be justified, but decisions of this Court have laid down the parameters of exercise of revisional jurisdiction by the High Court under Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure in an appeal against acquittal by a private party. (See : D. Stephens v. Nosiboll, AIR 1951 SC 196; K.C. Reddy v. State of Andhra Pradesh, AIR 1962 SC 1788; Akalu Ahir and Ors. v. Ramdeo Ram, (1973) 2 SCC 583; Pakalpati Narayana Gajapathi Raju and Ors. v. Bonapalli Peda Appadu and Anr., AIR 1975 SC 1854 and Mahendra Pratap Singh v. Sarju Singh, AIR 1968 SC 707).
13. The instant case is not one where any such illegality was committed by the Trial Court. In the absence any legal infirmity either in the procedure or in the conduct of the trial, there was no justification for the High Court to interfere in exercise of its revisional jurisdiction. It has repeatedly been held that the High Court should not re-appreciate the evidence to reach a finding different from the Trial Court. In the absence of manifest illegality resulting in grave miscarriage of justice, exercise of revisional jurisdiction in such cases is not warranted.
14. We are, therefore, satisfied that the High Court was not justified in interfering with the order of acquittal in exercise of its revisional jurisdiction at the instance of the informant. It may be that the High Court on appreciation of evidence on record may reach a conclusion different from that of the Trial Court. But that by itself is no justification for exercise of revisional jurisdiction under Section 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure against a judgment of acquittal. We cannot say that the judgment of the Trial Court in the instant case was perverse. No defect of procedure has been pointed out. There was also no improper acceptance or rejection of evidence nor was there any defect of procedure or illegality in the conduct of the trial vitiating the trial itself. At best the High Court thought that the prosecution witnesses were reliable while the Trial Court took the opposite view. This Court was repeatedly observed that in exercise of revisional jurisdiction against an order of acquittal at the instance of a private party, the Court exercises only limited jurisdiction and should not constitute itself into an appellate Court which has a much wider jurisdiction to go into questions of facts and law, and to convert an order of acquittal into one of conviction. It cannot be lost sight of that when a re-trial is ordered, the dice is heavily loaded against the accused and that itself must caution the Court exercising revisional jurisdiction. We, therefore, find no justification for the impugned order of the High Court ordering re-trial of the appellants.”
11. On a close scrutiny of the entire evidence, we are satisfied that the findings recorded by the Trial Court leading to the acquittal of accused persons do not suffer from any infirmity whatsoever and mere possibility of another view on the prosecution evidence will not by itself be a sufficient ground to warrant interference in a complainant revision against the acquittal. Learned Counsel for the applicant could not bring the case within the exceptions warranting interference with the impugned judgment of acquittal. We, therefore, do not find any good ground for interference.
12. For the foregoing reasons, the revision petition fails and is hereby dismissed.