Telephone Wire Carried 11kV Current? Supreme Court Says "Preposterous"

It sounds “completely preposterous” that a telephone wire carried 11KV current without melting on contact, the Supreme Court said on Tuesday while setting aside the conviction of two persons who were sentenced in a case of causing death by negligence.

A bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana allowed the appeal filed by two appellants against the February 2017 judgement of the Karnataka High Court which had confirmed the trial court verdict convicting and sentencing them to undergo imprisonment for one year and three months.

The apex court observed that in a case of circumstantial evidence, there is a risk of “jumping to conclusions” in haste. The incident had happened in November 2003 when a person, watching TV in his house, noticed a sudden sound on the TV and when he got up to separate the wires which were entwined together, he felt electric shock and died due to electrocution.

During the investigation, it was found that one of the appellants, who was a daily wage worker working under the supervision of another appellant who was an employee in the telephone department, had pulled the telephone wire while working on the pole.

It was said that the telephone wire got detached and fell on the 11 KV power line and electricity passed into the telephone wire due to which the incident happened.

It was alleged that the incident took place because of a negligent act on the part of the appellants.

“We are constrained to repeat our observation that it sounds completely preposterous that a telephone wire carried 11KV current without melting on contact and when such current passed through the television set, it did not blast and melt the wiring of the entire house,” the bench, also comprising Justices Krishna Murari and Hima Kohli, said.

In its judgement, the top court observed that the conviction of the appellants rests on circumstantial evidence.

It noted that the appellants had taken the defence that on the day of the incident, they had not attended any telephone wire repair at the place of the incident and the death was not due to their carelessness and negligence.

The bench noted that even if it is assumed that the deceased and prosecution witnesses who received the shock were wearing slippers at the time of contact, 11KV is still too strong and any contact with such a “high voltage current in all probability should have left any person who came in contact dead and his/her body charred”.

“We also find it difficult to see reason in the submission that telephone wires were able to carry current from an 11KV high tension line and did not immediately melt. It is even more difficult to assimilate that such current when passed through the television, did not blast the television set and set the entire wiring of the house on fire,” it said.

The apex court said allegations against the appellants are highly technical in nature and no report or even inspection was conducted by a technical expert to assess the veracity of the averments made by complainants to suggest that the incident took place due to their alleged acts.

“In case of circumstantial evidence, there is a risk of jumping to conclusions in haste. While evaluating such evidence the jury should bear in mind that inference of guilt should be the only reasonable inference from the facts,” it said.

“In the present case, however, the conviction of the accused persons seems wholly unjustified against the weight of the evidence adduced,” the bench observed, adding that the courts below were not justified in convicting them of negligence under section 304A read with section 34 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

While section 304A of the IPC deals with causing death by negligence, section 34 pertains to the acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention.

The bench noted that for bringing home the guilt of the accused, the prosecution has to firstly prove negligence and then establish direct nexus between the negligence of the accused and the victim's death.

The apex court said it is “even more unbelievable” that one of the appellants came in contact with the same voltage and managed to get away with a few abrasions.

“The appellants, therefore, are entitled to be given the benefit of doubt; more so, when there is no report of a technical expert to corroborate the prosecution story,” it said while setting aside the judgment of conviction and sentence.

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