Allahabad High Court sets aside convictions in Unnao massacre case and acquits appellants for want of reliable ocular evidence

A bench of Justices Rajnish Kumar and Zafeer Ahmad heard appeals against a common judgment dated 18.12.2004 in Sessions Trial No. 228 of 2001 arising out of Case Crime No. 41 of 2001 (Police Station Makhi, District Unnao), challenging convictions under Sections 148, 302/149, 307/149, 452 and 404 IPC and allied proceedings under the Arms Act. The appeals under Section 374(2) CrPC (Criminal Appeal Nos. 255/2005, 254/2005, 43/2005 and 231/2005) arose from allegations of a large-scale night-time attack in which five family members were killed and one child was injured.

The Court allowed the appeals, set aside the trial court’s conviction and sentence and acquitted the appellants, holding that the prosecution’s ocular case did not inspire confidence and that the trial court had proceeded on assumptions unsupported by reliable evidence. The Court observed that the trial judge “proceeded thereafter on the basis of assumption that the incident has been committed by the appellants only,” which vitiated the verdict. The Court, in its reasoning, observed: “In view of above and considering the overall facts and circumstances of the case, this Court is of the view that the findings recorded by learned trial Court are not tenable in the eyes of law and the appellants are also entitled for benefit of doubt and the impugned judgment and order passed by the trial Court is liable to be set-aside and the appellants are liable to be acquitted.” The judgment also noted established principles on eyewitness and injured witness evidence: “The evidence of an injured witness must be given due weightage being a stamped witness… The testimony of an injured witness has its own relevancy and efficacy.”

Background
The dispute arose from an FIR lodged on 12.02.2001 by Guddu (P.W.2) reporting that, on the night of 11/12 February 2001 at about 8–9 pm, a large group of persons entered his village hamlet and murdered five members of a family and assaulted a child. The prosecution relied on the oral testimony of three principal eyewitnesses — P.W.1 (Agana, wife of one deceased), P.W.2 (complainant Guddu) and P.W.3 (injured child Arvind) — recovery memos, site plans and post-mortem reports (Ext. Ka.5–9). Investigating officers recovered country-made firearms, cartridges and axes and submitted charges under IPC and the Arms Act; post-mortems showed ante-mortem firearm and axe injuries.

The trial court convicted eleven accused and sentenced them to concurrent terms including life imprisonment for murder; several other accused were acquitted on various counts. Convicts including Shankar, Deshraj, Shiv Ram, Shiv Nath, Mishri Lal, Ram Pal, Shiv Kumar, Ram Prakash, Ram Kumar, Ram Vilas and Mewa Lal appealed.

Appellants argued before the High Court that the ocular account was inherently improbable: eighteen named assailants and several unnamed persons could not have been identified in poor light, many witnesses were related/interested, the FIR was recorded after delay and inconsistently, recoveries were not reliably proved, and medical and investigation records had lacunae. The State defended the convictions, submitting that eye‑witnesses and the injured witness were reliable, source of light (lanterns/lamps) permitted identification, motive of prior enmity was established and contradictions were minor.

The High Court examined eyewitness testimony, site plans, post-mortem timing and the record of recoveries and found material contradictions and improbabilities: contradictions as to where witnesses hid, inconsistent accounts of lighting, implausible ability to identify numerous masked assailants from hiding positions, gaps in the FIR provenance and unexplained aspects of investigation and recovery. The Court applied and discussed Supreme Court precedents on ocular and injured witness evidence and the vicarious liability doctrine under Section 149 IPC (citing cases such as Naresh, Om Pal, Dalip Singh, Haribhau and others), and observed that where ocular testimony did not “inspire confidence,” conviction could not be sustained. The Court held that the trial court had reached its conclusion on assumptions and had failed to adequately weigh contradictions and investigative lapses; consequently the accused were entitled to benefit of doubt.

Final result: the appeals succeeded, the High Court set aside the conviction and sentence dated 18.12.2004 and acquitted the appellants, directing their release forthwith unless detained in connection with any other matter, and ordered transmission of trial records to the trial court.

Case Details:
Case No.: Criminal Appeal No. 255 of 2005 and connected Criminal Appeals No. 254 of 2005, 43 of 2005 and 231 of 2005
Case Title: Shankar and 5 Ors. v. State of U.P. (and connected appeals)
Appearances:
For the Petitioner(s): Smt. Nalini Jain; Adarsh Mehrotra; Desh Ratan Mishra; Madhu Bala Srivastava; Rajeev Kumar Mishra Rudra; Soniya Mishra; Surya Bux Singh; Amar Nath Dubey; R K S Chauhan; Dharmendra Singh; Aarif Ali; Akil Imam; Furkan; Hemant Kumar Misra; Shreesh Kumar M; Shreesh Kumar Mishra Atal; Chandra Sekhar Pandey; Chandra Shekher Pandey
For the Respondent(s): Govt. Advocate; Pawan Kumar Misra, A.G.A.

Source: 2026 CaseBase(ALL) 48