JUDGMENT
L. Rath, J.
1. This is a revision at the instance of the informant against the judgment of acquittal in a casein which the opp party No. 1 stood trial under Secs. 325/307, IPC The petitioner is the father-in-law of the opp: party No. 1 (hereinafter referred to as the opp. party. The facts briefly narrated are that the opp, party’s wife after having led married life for eight years and giving birth to a female child had gone away to the house of her parents and was staying there. The opp. party had also gone there and was staying in the house of his father-in-law. On the date of occurrence, the opp. party asked his wife PW 1 to accompany him to their village. The later having refused, the opp. party got enraged and saying that he Would kill his brother-in-law, PW 11, rushed inside the room where he was sleeping and struck his head with a crowbar causing injuries on the head and thereafter came away running to the cowshed and created panic by revolving a crowbar and went on dashing his head against wooden pillars and jumping frequently, dashing his head against the horizontal pole supporting the overhead shelf of the cowshed. The pole crashed down and some long bamboo pieces on the shelf fell upon him causing him injuries and rendering him unconscious Thereafter the witnesses and others caught hold of the Opp. party and tied him with a rope. The learned Assistant Sessions Judge considering the evidence though found the occurrence as narrated against the opp. party to have been proved and the nature of the injuries caused to PW 11 being such that the same could have caused his death, yet acquitted the opp. party since the multiple injuries on him had not been explained either in the FIR or before the investigating officer and holding that reliance could not be placed on the explanation for the injuries on the accused offered for the first time in Court.
2. It is the submission of the learned counsel for the petitioner that since the acquittal of the opp, party was based on the aforesaid sole ground, the judgment is vitiated as on the one hand it was not for, the prosecution to explain the injuries on the opp. party which were simple in nature, and that as a matter of fact the injuries were explained by the witnesses.
3. The injury report Ext. 4 in respect of the opp. party shows him to have suffered ten injuries of which four were lacerated and on the vertex of the sizes 3 1/2″ x 1/4 ” x bone deep, 3″ x 1/4″ x bone deep, 2″ 1/2x 1/4+” x bone deep and 2 1/4′, x 1/4″x bone deep respectively. The fifth injury was a small incised wound of the size 2″x1/6th” over the vertex capable of being inflicted by a sharp weapon. The other injuries were abrasions. In AIR 1979 SC 1010 (Jagdish v. State of Rajasthan their Lordships of the Supreme Court observed that the liability of the prosecution to explain the injuries on the accused would arise if the injuries are serious and severe and not superficial and that the injuries must have been caused at the time of the occurrence. It would be noticed that the observation of the apex Court was not that the injuries must be be grievous in nature so as to attach liability on the prosecution to explain them. All that is required is that the injuries must be serious and not superficial. The submission of the learned counsel for the petitioner that the injuries being simple in nature the prosecution had no duty to explain them is not acceptable. There is no denying that a simple injury may also be severe and serious. The nature of the multiple injuries as were found on the person of the opp. party in this case could not but be said to be serious and severe. They were certainly not superficial. Considering such question, it was hold by a Division Bench of this Court in 1990 Cri. L. J. 814 (State of Orissa v. Sarat Chandra Puri) that where the injuries received by the injured in course of the same transaction were not superficial but two of them were on the vital part of. the body namely on the front and on the back side of the skull, and the prosecution led no evidence to explain as to under wiat circumstances the accused sustained these injuries, it must be held that the prosecution did not come with clean hands and was guilty of suppression of true events. It was again held by the same Division Bench in (1990) 3 OCR 38(Ganesh Behera and Ors. v. State) that where the injuries found on the body of the accused persons were not minor or superficial but were serious and dangerous in nature, prosecution is bound to prove as to how and in what circumstances the accused had sustained the injuries or else it is to fail. The injuries suffered by the accused in those cases though were simple in nature yet were on the bridge of the nose and on the right scapula so far as one of the accused was concerned and a punctured wound over the left thigh above the knee joint and a lacerated wound on the upper lip so far as the other accused was concerned. In such position of the law, the submission of the learned counsel for the petitioner must be rejected. It was the case of the opp. party that PW 11 and his mother had assaulted him with club and kitchen blade and that he had to brandish a crowbar to save himself in which process the crowbar struck the head of PW 11 causing him the injuries. The learned counsel for the petitioner urges that the injuries on the person of opp. party had been explained by PWs 1, 2, 5, and 10 that after assaulting PW. 11 the opp. party had rushed inside, the cowshed and there to have swung a crowbar and to have dashed his head against the beam supporting the shelf bringing it down and to have sustained injuries in the process. As has been rightly observed by the learned Assistant Sessions Judge, such explanation having come for the first time in the Court was not worthy to be acted upon, The view taken by him that the injuries on the accused having not been explained either in the FIR or before the I. O., such explanation given for the first time in Court is not to be accepted cannot be taken exception to. Such conduct of the prosecution justifiably leads to the conclusion of it having suppressed the genesis of the occurrence and to have not come with clean hands. For such reasons, the order of acquittal passed by the learned Assistant Sessions judge cannot be found fault with.
4. In the result, the revision has no merit and is dismissed.