Allahabad HC convicts two men in 1984 murder case, cancels acquittal after 42 years

Lucknow, The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court has convicted two persons in a 1984 murder case and forfeited their assets after more than four decades, officials said.

A division bench of Justices Rajneesh Kumar and Babita Rani on Monday allowed the state government’s appeal and held the accused guilty of murder not amounting to murder under Section 304 of the IPC.

The court ordered that the two surviving defendants be arrested and appear before it on May 11 for a sentencing hearing.

There were four defendants in the case, all of whom were acquitted by a trial court in 1986 on grounds of self-defense. However, two of them died during the pendency of the appeal, leaving the remaining two to face the verdict of the Supreme Court.

The case remains till an incident on June 15, 1984 in Maakhi police station area of ​​Unnao district. According to the prosecution, the deceased, Jamuna Prasad, was constructing a drain on the roof of his house when the accused, Tulsi Ram, Laxmi Narayan, Jagat Pal and Harnam, objected to it, leading to an altercation.

The dispute escalated, and the accused allegedly attacked Jamuna Prasad and his brother Amrit Lal with sticks and spears. Jamuna Prasad succumbed to his injuries on the way to the hospital.

The trial court acquitted the accused, noting that they acted in self-defence as they also sustained injuries, which the prosecution did not explain.

Rejecting this reasoning, the Supreme Court found that taking a person’s life over a minor dispute, such as water drainage, cannot be justified as self-defense and struck down the trial court’s findings as “totally flawed,” according to the order.

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