HYDERABAD: A division bench of the Sindh High Court, Hyderabad circuit, set aside the death sentence of an accused in a nine-year-old murder case and acquitted him. The judgement was authored by justice Khadim Hussain Tunio while the bench that heard the arguments of prosecution and defence counsels on Feb 2, was headed by Justice Nazar Akbar.

Appellant Faheem was awarded capital punishment by additional sessions judge-III under section 265-H(ii) CrPC for murder of one Mairaj whose brother Shahid had lodged a case against him. The murder took place on April 15, 2012 in the city and a case was lodged vide FIR No. 35/12.

The complainant alleged that his brother was stabbed to death by Faheem in his room. Mairaj was taken to civil hospital where he was pronounced dead. The complainant said that a quarrel had started between Faheem and his brother but the matter was settled then. Faheem, however, nursed a grudge and murdered Mairaj with dagger alongwith two unidentified persons.

The counsel for the appellant said that he was innocent and falsely implicated by prosecution which has no ounce of evidence to support charges levelled against him. He said that as per FIR only one accused carried a knife yet no body attempted to stop him from committing murder of complainant’s brother and none tried to apprehend accused.

The court noted that on the touchstone, case of prosecution is that appellant stabbed deceased multiple times with a dagger and medico-legal officer noted 18 different wounds, in all, on deceased’s body. The court noted that a strange aspect of the case was that two unknown culprits were shown to be empty handed and Faheem allegedly was armed with a dagger which he threw away after commission of offence at the scene of crime.

The court failed to understand why three persons including two prosecution witnesses and complainant himself made zero efforts to catch hold of culprits who were empty handed and allowed them to run away from the room.

“We find that incident had not taken place in a manner as stated by prosecution. There are strong circumstances in the prosecution case which expose reasonable doubt and led us to hold that prosecution has not proved its case against appellant beyond a reasonable doubt keeping the assertion of FIR in juxtaposition of evidence adduced by prosecution”, the court said.

The judgement said that the court has reached undisputed conclusion that prosecution has failed to prove its case against appellant therefore his appeal is allowed, the conviction and sentence of Faheem is hereby set aside and he is acquitted of the charge by extending him benefit of doubt.

Published in Dawn, February 14th, 2021