CONFLICTING

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 110, 31 December 1931, Page 6

CONFLICTING

DIFFICULTIES OF JUBGES IN INDIAN CRIMINAL COURTS INNOCENT IMPLICATED The difficulties wlrch beset Ihe judges of India's Criminal Courts, when they have only the statement? of natives to guide them. wero strikingly exemplified in a petition wh'ch came before the Judicial Committe? of the Privy Council in London. Petitioner, Shalr'nchi Kban, sought leave to appeal against the sentenc of death passed upon him by the Se: - sions judge of Attock in January. anrl subsequently confirmed by the High Court of Judicature, Lahore, for the murder of Fazal Hussain Shah Shahinchi Khan was ind'cted on the capital charge in company with two other men, who were alleged to bc friends of his. Of these two, one was acquittec but the other, Makhan Shah, war found guilty, along w'th Shv.lvneTr Khan. In the case of Makhan Shali however, the High Court at Lahore saw fit to reduce his sentence frou death to H'ansportation for life. Briefly told, the case for the prosecution was that enmitv ex;sted be tween a party, to which Makhan be longed, and another party, of whicl the murdered man was a member This fj^eling, it was stated, had it: origin in the abduction, two and i half years prev'ously, of a cousin o Fazal Hussain Shah. Enm'ty Alleged As against Shahinchi Khan, it w?" alleged that there was enmity be tween him and Fazal Hussain Shah be cause a cousin of the latter's gave evidence aga'nst him in the magistrate's court shortly before the murder. On the night of July 27-28, 1930 Shahinchi Khan and Makhan Shah were participating in a smoking party at one of those great centres of

In lie.n «ocial intercouse — a well. F, ! Ilus-nin Shah approached carry'ng some food, whereupon Shalloch! Khan and his companion sudd niy d: e".v spenr-heads from place:'. of c-oncf-almen'c in their clothing, fixed them on st.ieks which they were carrying, and attacked the ncw arrival. Stahbed in two pia ces in the ahdomen, Fazal Hussain Shah fell to the gound, and his assailants fled from the snot. The woundcd man was aftenwir 's eanied to the police stalio'i at Campbellpur, seven ■ miles away, where he made a statement. which was eventually treated at the i irl as a dying declaration. He wa? then taken xo hospital where he expirod. During the trial before the Judge of Attock, who sat with four assossen\ a. remarkable conflict of evidence foecurred. Ohe witness for the yrosecution stated, "I cannot say which blow was struck by whom. Ile i was stabbed by Shahinchi Khan and : Mrkhan Shah almost simultaneously." \ Two otbe-'s attrihufod the fatal in- } ,'ury to Shahinchi Khan, as did also Fazal Hussain Shah in his dying statement. The accused men denied that they we *e in any way concerned in the mnider. They maintained that they were being implicated in the crime through enmity, and they called two witnesses, who declared that they were at wellsf some distance away. at the time of the murder, and that ohere was no disturb^nce there. The Sessions judge, in his judgment, polnted out that certain legal authorities had remarked that dying men in the Punjab o£ten implicated nnocent enemies with the actual culprits. Mr. C. S. Sm'tli, who presented the petition on behalf of Shahinchi Khan, eommented on the credibility of the witnesses, but the chainnan of the committee, Lord Macmillan, int'mated that the sought-for leave to appeal could not be granted.