The court said the motive of the murder is manifestly absent in this case. (Representational)
A court here acquitted a man accused of killing his brother for "lack of evidence", saying that police made "some manipulations" during its investigation to "bring some amount of consistency" in the probe.
The court was hearing a case where a headless body was found inside a sack in a house at Kirari in northwest Delhi on August 4, 2016.
After identifying the victim as a tenant, police arrested his brother who was living with him.
According to the prosecution, the accused had vacated the house after murdering his brother. "I hold that for lack of sufficient and cogent evidence, the charges against the accused could not be proved beyond reasonable doubts. Accused Akhilesh is accordingly acquitted for want of evidence," Additional Sessions Judge Neeraj Gaur said in an order passed on August 25.
The court noted that a recovery made exclusively on the disclosure statement of the accused was not admissible as evidence and both the alleged weapons, knife and brick, did not have any bloodstains. The absence of any public witness also created doubt about the very recoveries, the court observed.
Further, the court held that the recovery of the victim's mobile phone from the accused was also inadmissible as evidence as the recovery was made exclusively on the basis of the accused's information.
Noting that in one of the statements, there was an overwriting at the position of the date and initials of the investigating officer (IO), the court said the police itself was not sure about the date of commission of the offence and "some manipulations were made during the investigation to bring some amount of consistency".
"I am finding it very strange that only with a view to hide the body, the beheading would be done. Another lapse of investigation is that the sack in which the body was kept was admittedly not seized by the IO. In my opinion, the plastic bag was a vital piece of evidence and withholding the same raises further suspicion in the prosecution story," the judge said.
The prosecution could not prove beyond reasonable doubt that the accused was last seen with the victim in a factory and there were doubts regarding the date of vacation of the tenanted premises by the accused, the court said.
As per the complainant's wife, she noticed the suspicious bag in the house at 7.30 pm on August 5, 2016, but the complaint was lodged on the previous date, the court said.
"The lodging of a complaint a day before creates doubt as regards the information given to the police and it cannot be ruled out that the information has been antedated," the court said. The fact that the big bag from which the blood was trailing out was not noticed by the complainant's wife despite her inspection of the premises at the time of its vacation created serious doubts in the prosecution story, the court said.
Though the prosecution was not under a burden to prove a motive in every case, in a case based on circumstantial evidence, the presence of a motive was important, the court said, adding that "the motive of the murder is manifestly absent in the present case".
"The chain of circumstances has many missing links. These circumstances are not of such a nature to draw an inference that the accused committed the murder," the court said. It further said these circumstances were also not of such a nature and tendency to be consistent with the only hypothesis of the guilt of the accused.
Aman Vihar police had registered an FIR against the accused on the basis of the landlord's statement and a charge sheet was filed in December 2016.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)