Narayanan Nair Raghavan Nair vs The State Of Travancore-Cochin

Rewritten Version Notice: This is a rewritten version of the original judgment.

Court: Supreme Court of India

Case Number: Not extracted

Decision Date: 26 September, 1955

Coram: Bose

In that case, the Supreme Court recorded that the appellant, Raghavan, had been found guilty of murder under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code for the killing of a man named Ayyappan, and that the conviction had resulted in a death sentence. The appellant’s younger brother, Bhaskaran, had also been charged, but his conviction was under Section 324 of the Indian Penal Code and had attracted a term of two years’ imprisonment; the judgment made clear that the brother’s conviction was not the subject of the present discussion. The record showed that six persons had witnessed the murder, and that both the trial court and the appellate court had accepted the testimony of each of these eye-witnesses as reliable. The Court therefore indicated that it would not examine the credibility of that evidence further, but would instead assess the case on the basis of the facts that had been established by those witnesses.

The factual background described a dispute that was then pending between the appellant and his grandmother, Parvathi Amma, who had instituted proceedings seeking partition and separate possession of her share in the estate of her son, the father of the appellant and his two brothers. During the pendency of those proceedings, the grandmother transferred her interest in the estate to her daughter, Parvathi Lakshmi Amma, who was identified in the record as PW 10. The record also noted that PW 10 was the widow of the deceased, Ayyappan. After proper notice had been given to the parties, two commissioners, Balakrishna Pillai (PW 5) and Thomas Kuriyan (PW 6), who had been appointed to carry out the partition, went to the disputed site, conducted a survey and took measurements. While this survey was in progress, the two accused entered the scene and began to hurl stones at Velayudhan Nair (PW 1), who was the son-in-law of the deceased, and also verbally abused him. Some of the stones actually struck PW 1, causing visible injuries, and the courts accepted this fact. The courts, however, were unable to determine exactly which of the many stones had hit the witness. Nonetheless, it was undisputed that the appellant and his brother had initiated the assault by pelting PW 1 with stones and insulting him.

According to the testimony, PW 1 responded to the stone-throwing by slapping the appellant across the cheek, which led to a brief scuffle between the two men. At that moment, Krishnan Nair (PW 14) and the deceased, Ayyappan, approached the altercation. Krishnan Nair attempted to separate the combatants, while the deceased, who was the father-in-law of PW 1, addressed his son-in-law, saying, “Velayudhan! you should not quarrel. I shall find a solution for this.” Following that admonition, the appellant withdrew a pen-knife from his waist and struck the deceased. The deceased tried to fend off the first blow, which landed on the back of his left forearm, and the appellant immediately delivered a second blow that struck the chest. The wound to the chest proved to be fatal and ultimately caused the death of Ayyappan. While this was occurring, the second accused arrived and inflicted a stab wound on the deceased’s back with another knife. The record later indicated that this second wound did not cause death, although the attending doctor observed that it probably aggravated the shock resulting from the fatal chest wound. The two accused were each held individually responsible for the separate injuries they caused, and Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code was not invoked in attributing liability.

In this case, the Court noted that the second accused inflicted a stab wound on the deceased's back with another knife. Although that wound did not cause death, the doctor testified that it probably aggravated the shock produced by the fatal wound. The Court observed that each accused was held individually responsible for the separate injuries he caused, and that Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code was not applied. The first question before the Court was whether the offence was murder or culpable homicide not amounting to murder under Section 304. The Court focused on the chest injury and noted that Ayyappan did not die immediately after being struck. He was carried about a mile on a cot to a waiting jeep and taken to the hospital, where his dying declaration was recorded. The victim was then handed over to medical officer PW 9, who examined him and decided that surgery was necessary because a portion of the omentum had protruded through the wound. The doctor also reported difficulty in breathing, describing a loss of the power of controlling respiration and noted that this condition required immediate medical intervention. He explained that a minor operation was required to push the omentum back into place, as this could not be done externally. The operation involved extending the external portion of the wound to allow proper handling of the omentum, and the patient died approximately twelve hours later. Counsel for the accused argued vigorously that the wound itself was not fatal and that, had the doctor not interfered, the victim would have survived. The counsel relied on a passage from Modi's Medical Jurisprudence, 12th edition, page 270, asserting that the diaphragm is not a vital organ. The passage further stated that injuries to the diaphragm are unlikely to be fatal unless a vital organ in contact with it is also injured. The Court did not interpret the passage to mean that diaphragm injuries cannot be fatal; rather, it read the text to indicate that such injuries are likely to be fatal, although not rapidly so. A later passage in the same work supports this view, noting that rupture “gives rise to much pain on coughing or deep breathing, and may cause death from severe shock.” The Court held that the issue was fundamentally a question of fact and that Modi's text does not establish that diaphragm injuries are never fatal. Some diaphragm injuries are fatal, and some are not, so the determination depends on the facts of each case, specifically whether the injury in the present case was of the fatal type. Both the trial court and the appellate court had relied on the doctor's opinion, which stated emphatically that the injury was fatal. The Court found no reason to depart from those findings and saw no evidence of medical negligence in the management of the patient.

The Court recorded that the dying declaration, identified as Exhibit K, contained the declaration that the declarant could no longer breathe regularly or properly. Medical testimony explained that loss of diaphragmatic function eliminates the ability to control respiration, and that such an injury creates a risk of the thoracic and abdominal organs colliding. The post-mortem examination confirmed that the stomach and the omentum had herniated through the wound, with the omentum protruding externally. Both the pleura and the diaphragm were found to be cut, and the wound extended into the abdominal cavity. From these findings the Court accepted that the injury was sufficient in the ordinary course of nature to cause death.

The State then argued that the incident constituted a sudden affray and therefore fell within the fourth exception to Section 300 of the Indian Penal Code, which requires that no undue advantage be taken of the other party. The Court noted that this exception can apply only where the accused does not exploit an advantage over the victim. In the present case the victim was unarmed, made no threatening gestures, and merely urged the accused’s opponent to cease fighting. Moreover, the exception demands that the lethal assault be directed at the person who dies. Here the fight was between Velayudhan, the first witness, and the appellant; the deceased was not a participant in the struggle and did not attempt to separate the combatants. He only asked his son-in-law to stop fighting and offered to settle the dispute. The State further suggested that the victim’s request might have been perceived as a threat, especially because the appellant had already been provoked by a slap. The Court found that the evidence did not support such an inference, and the appellant’s account of being beaten, grappled, and seized by the neck was not credibly believed. The factual disputes were resolved by concurrent findings that did not establish the conditions required for the fourth exception. Consequently, the Court held that the exception did not apply and affirmed the appellant’s conviction under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code.

Regarding sentencing, the Court observed that the slap on the face had caused the appellant, who appeared to be hot-blooded, to lose self-control. This loss of temper did not justify the killing of an innocent by-stander who intervened only to advise the opponent to stop fighting. Nevertheless, the Court concluded that the circumstances did not warrant a death sentence. There was no pre-meditation, and the knife was not in the appellant’s hand at the outset; it was drawn from the waist only after the slap and after the quarrel with Velayudhan had begun. On these grounds, the Court determined that a lesser sentence was appropriate.

The Court altered the punishment imposed on the appellant, substituting the previously ordered death penalty with a sentence of transportation for life. In reaching this decision, the Court examined the circumstances surrounding the incident, noting that the appellant had acted in a sudden and heated manner after being slapped, without any pre-meditation, and that the weapon used was not already in his possession but was drawn only after the confrontation began. Considering these facts, the Court concluded that a lesser sentence than death was appropriate, consistent with the principle that the ultimate penalty should be imposed only in the most serious cases involving deliberation or extreme cruelty. Consequently, the appellate petition was granted, but the relief was confined solely to the question of the appropriate sentence; the conviction itself was left untouched. The judgment therefore affirmed the conviction while commuting the capital punishment to life transportation, thereby resolving the appeal on the sentencing issue alone.