The Supreme Court of India on Wednesday acquitted two men, Akhtar Ali and Prem Pal Verma, in a 2014 case involving the kidnapping, sexual assault, and murder of a minor girl in Uttarakhand. A three-judge bench of Justice Vikram Nath, Justice Sanjay Karol, and Justice Sandeep Mehta, in a detailed judgment authored by Justice Mehta, overturned the conviction and death sentence handed to Akhtar Ali and the life sentence to Prem Pal Verma by the trial court, which had been upheld by the Uttarakhand High Court.
The judgment highlighted significant lapses, inconsistencies, and “gravely tainted and suspicious actions” in the investigation. The Court found that the prosecution’s case, based entirely on circumstantial evidence, failed to establish a complete and unbroken chain of events necessary to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, particularly concerning the ‘last seen theory,’ the arrest of the accused, and the collection and handling of scientific evidence, including DNA reports.
Case Background
The case originates from a complaint lodged on November 21, 2014, after a minor girl, Ms. K, went missing from a wedding ceremony at Sheeshmahal in Kathgodam. Four days later, on November 25, 2014, her body was discovered in a forest near the Gaula River. A post-mortem examination concluded that the cause of death was “shock and haemorrhage resulting from injuries to the vaginal and perianal region caused by sexual assault and blunt force trauma.”
Following an investigation, the police arrested Akhtar Ali, Prem Pal Verma, and a third individual, Junior Masih alias Foxy. The trial court convicted Akhtar Ali under Sections 376A, 363, and 201 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and multiple sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, sentencing him to death. Prem Pal Verma was convicted under Section 212 of the IPC for harbouring an offender. Junior Masih was acquitted. The High Court of Uttarakhand upheld the convictions and the death sentence, leading to the present appeals before the Supreme Court.
Arguments of the Parties
Counsel for the Appellants, Ms. Manisha Bhandari, argued:
- The prosecution’s case was built on inconsistent and fabricated circumstantial evidence.
- A crucial witness, Nikhil Chand (the victim’s cousin), who first informed the police about the location of the body, was never examined, warranting an adverse inference against the prosecution.
- The recovery of the body was suspicious, as it was found in close proximity to the wedding venue days after an extensive search had yielded no results.
- The arrest of Akhtar Ali from Ludhiana was staged to plant evidence, and the DNA report was unreliable due to a broken chain of custody and inexplicable inconsistencies, such as the presence of semen in the cervical swab but its absence in the vaginal swab and cervical smear.
Counsel for the State of Uttarakhand, Ms. Vanshaja Shukla, contended:
- The arrest of Akhtar Ali was based on meticulous mobile surveillance that tracked his location from the crime scene to Ludhiana.
- The post-mortem report provided irrefutable evidence of a brutal sexual assault and murder.
- Scientific and DNA evidence conclusively established Akhtar Ali’s involvement, as his DNA profile matched with semen found on the victim’s cervical swab, undershirt, and underwear.
- The conduct of the accused, including their presence near the crime scene and subsequent absconding, completed the chain of incriminating circumstances.
Supreme Court’s Analysis and Findings
The Supreme Court undertook a meticulous re-evaluation of the evidence, applying the strict standards required for cases based on circumstantial evidence as laid down in Sharad Birdhichand Sharda v. State of Maharashtra. The Court observed that for a conviction, the circumstances must be fully established and form a chain “so complete as not to leave any reasonable ground for the conclusion consistent with the innocence of the accused.”
On Motive and ‘Last Seen’ Theory: The Court found that the prosecution “utterly failed to attribute any clear or convincing motive” to the accused. More significantly, it dismantled the ‘last seen theory,’ noting that the witnesses who claimed to have seen the appellants near the wedding venue recorded their statements five days after the incident, raising “a legitimate apprehension that the ‘last seen’ circumstance was subsequently manufactured.”
The bench heavily criticized the failure to examine Nikhil Chand. The judgment stated, “The utter failure of the Investigating Officer to question Nikhil Chand so as to find out the source of his knowledge about the dead body of the victim girl depicts gravely tainted and suspicious actions of the Investigating agencies.” The non-examination, the Court held, “compels the Court to draw an adverse inference against the prosecution.”
On Arrest and Recoveries: The Court found the circumstances surrounding Akhtar Ali’s arrest from Ludhiana to be “something out of fiction and… ex facie unbelievable.” It noted that the police’s claim of tracing him through his mobile number was falsified by the record, which showed call detail records were procured months after the arrest. The Court concluded that the process of apprehension and arrest came “under a grave cloud of doubt.” The alleged recovery of the victim’s hairband at the instance of the accused was also deemed “dubious and unworthy of credence.”
On Scientific Evidence: The Court found the DNA evidence, the lynchpin of the prosecution’s case, to be “suspicious and wholly unreliable.” It pointed to a “glaring inconsistency”: semen was reportedly found in the cervical swab but was absent in the vaginal samples and the cervical smear slides prepared from the same anatomical site. The judgment noted, “The presence in one and absence in the other defies scientific probability and undermines the credibility of the prosecution’s reliance on the DNA report.” This, the Court reasoned, “strongly suggests that the presence of DNA of accused-appellant No. 1-Akhtar Ali in the cervical swab was engineered by the prosecution.”
Further, the Court raised doubts about the qualifications of the DNA expert, Dr. Manoj Kumar Agarwal (PW-34), who held an M.Sc. in Botany, a subject the Court observed “has nothing to do with DNA profiling, particularly that of human beings.”
The Final Decision
Concluding its analysis, the Supreme Court held that the prosecution had failed to establish the charges. The judgment stated, “Given the above infirmities, the so-called links in the chain of circumstances stand broken. The prosecution has, therefore, failed to prove the guilt of the accused-appellants beyond a reasonable doubt.”
The Court emphasised the high degree of circumspection required before imposing the death penalty, stating, “Any hasty or mechanical application of the death penalty, without ensuring the highest standards of proof and procedural fairness, not only undermines the rule of law but risks the gravest miscarriage of justice.”
The Court accordingly set aside the judgments of the High Court and the trial court. “The accused-appellants are acquitted of all charges. They shall be released forthwith, if not required in any other case,” the order stated.
