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PETITIONER:

ANANT CHINTAMAN LAGU

Vs.

RESPONDENT:

THE STATE OF BOMBAY

DATE OF JUDGMENT:

14/12/1959

BENCH:

HIDAYATULLAH, M.

BENCH:

HIDAYATULLAH, M.

DAS, S.K.

SARKAR, A.K.

CITATION:

1960 AIR 500 1960 SCR (2) 460

CITATOR INFO :

F 1963 SC 74 (38)

RF 1970 SC1321 (16)

F 1972 SC1331 (32)

D 1984 SC1622 (156,170)

R 1988 SC1011 (9,27)

ACT:

Criminal Law-Murder by poisoning-Circumstantial evidence

-Poison not detected in body of deceased-Conduct of accused,

both before and after-Conviction for murder.

HEADNOTE:

At the trial of a person for murder by alleged poisoning,

the fact of death by poisoning is provable by circumstantial

evidence, notwithstanding that the autopsy as well as the

chemical analysis fail to disclose any poison; though the

cause of death may not appear to be established by direct

evidence, the medical evidence of experts and the

circumstances of the case may be sufficient to infer that

the death must be the result of the administration to the

victim of some unrecognised poison or drug which acts as a

poison, and a conviction can be rested on circumstantial

evidence provided that it is so decisive that the court can

unhesitatingly hold that the death was not a natural one.

Per S. K. Das and M. Hidayatullah, jj.-Where the evidence

showed that the appellant who was the medical adviser of the

deceased, deliberately set about first to ingratiate himself

in the good opinions of his patient and becoming her

confidant, found out all about her affairs and gradually

began managing her affairs, that all the time he was

planning to get at her property and had forged her signature

on a dividend warrant and had obtained undated cheque from

her and then under the guise of helping her to have a

consultation with a specialist in Bombay took her in a

train, and then brought the patient unconscious to a

hospital bereft of all property with which she had started

from home and gave a wrong name to cover her identity and

wrong history of her ailments, that after her death he

abandoned the body to be dealt with by the hospital as an

unclaimed body, spread the story that she was alive and made

use of the situation to misappropriate all her properties,

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and that he tried by all means to avoid postmortem

examination and when questioned gave false and conflicting

statements, held that if the deceased died in circumstances

which prima facie admit of either disease or homicide by

poisoning one must look at the conduct of the appellant both

before and after the death of the deceased, that the corpus

delicti could be held to be proved by a number of facts

which render the commission of the crime certain, and that

the medical evidence in the case and the conduct of the

appellant unerringly pointed to the conclusion that the

death of the deceased was the result of the administration

of some unrecognised poison or drug which would act as a

poison and that the appellant was the person who

administered it.

461

Per Sarkar, J.-If it could be established in this case that

the deceased had died an unnatural death, the conclusion

would be inevitable that unnatural death had been brought

about by poison, but the circumstances were not such that

from them the only reasonable conclusion to be drawn was

that the deceased died an unnatural death. Held, that the

prosecution had failed to prove the guilt of the appellant.

Regina v. Onufrejczyk, [1955] 1 Q.B. 388, The King v. Horry,

[1952] N.Z.L. 111, Mary Ann Nash's case, (1911) 6 Cr. App.

R. 225 and Donnall's case, (1817) 2 C.& K, 308n, considered

and relied on.

JUDGMENT:

CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION: Criminal Appeal No. 73 of

1959.

Appeal by special leave from the judgment and order dated

January 16/20th, 1959, of the Bombay High Court in

Confirmation case No. 25 of 1958 with Criminal Appeal No.

1372 of 1958, arising out of. the judgment and order dated

October 27, 1958, of the Sessions Judge, Poona, in Sessions

Case No. 52 of 1958.

A. S. R. Chtiri, S. N. Andley, J. B. Dadachanji and

Rameshwar Nath, for the appellant.

H. N. Seervai, Advocate-General for the State of Bombay,

Porus A. Mehta and R. H. Dhebar, for the respondent.

1959. December 14. The Judgment of S. K. Das and

Hidayatullah, JJ., was delivered by Hidayatullah, J. Sarkar,

J., delivered a separate Judgment.

HIDAYATULLAH J.-This appeal by special leave is against the

judgment of the Bombay High Court [J. C. Shah, J. (now of

the Supreme Court) and V. S. Desai, J.] by which it

maintained the conviction of the appellant, Lagu, under s.

302 of the Indian Penal Code, and confirmed the sentence of

death passed on him by Shri V. A. Naik (now Naik, J.)

Sessions Judge, Poona.

The appellant was tried for the murder of one Laxmibai

Karve, and the charge held proved against him was that on or

about the night between November 12 and 13, 1956, either at

Poona or in the course of a railway journey between Poona

and Bombay, he administered to the said Laxmibai Karve, some

unrecognised poison or drug which would act as a poison,

59

462

with the intention of causing her death and which did cause

her death.

Laxmibai Karve was a resident of Poona where she lived

at 93-95, Shukrawar Peth. Before her marriage of she was

known as Indumati, Indutai or Indu Ponkshe. In the year

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1922, she married Anant Ramachandra Karve, a widower with a

son by name, Vishnu. On her marriage, as is the custom, she

was named Laxmibai by the family of her husband and was

known as Laxmibai Karve. She was also known as Mai or Mai

Karve. From Laxmibai there were born two sons, Ramachandra

(P.W. 1) and Purshottam alias Arvind, who died in 1954.

Anant Ramachandra Karve was a moderately rich man, who had

been successful in business. He died in 1945 of pleurisy. He

was attended till his death by the appellant and his

brother, B. C. Lagu, both of whom are doctors. Anant

Ramachandra Karve left a will dated February 28, 1944. Prior

to the execution of the will, he had gifted Rs. 30,000 to

his son, Vishnu, to set him up in business. By his will he

gave the house No. 93-95, Shukrawar Peth, Poona to

Ramachandra with a right of residence in at least three

rooms to his widow, Laxmibai and a further right to her to

receive Rs. 50 per month from the rent of the house. He

assigned an insurance policy of Rs. 5,000 in her favour. The

business was left to Ramachandra. The cash deposits in Bank,

Post Office and with other persons together with the right

to recover loans from debtors in the Bhor State were given

to Purushottam alias Arvind. Certain bequests of lands and

debentures were made to Visbnu's children. Laxmibai was also

declared owner of all her ornaments of about 60 tolas of

gold and nose-ring and pearl bangles which were described in

the will.

In addition to what she inherited from her husband,

Laxmibai inherited about Rs. 25,000 invested in shares from

her mother, Girjabai, and another 60 tolas of gold

ornaments. In January 1954, Purushottam alias Arvind died at

Poona. By Purushottam's death Laxmibai also inherited all

the property held by him.

463

Thus, at the time of her death, Laxmibai possessed of about

560 shares in diverse Electric' Companies, debentures in

South Madras Electric Supply Corporation and Mettur Chemical

and Industrial Corporation, a sum of Rs. 7,882-15-0 at the

Bank of Maharashtra, a sum of Rs. 35,000 in deposit with one

Vasudeo Sadashiv Joshi, gold and pearl ornaments and sundry

movables like clothes, house hold furniture, radio etc.

In the year 1946, Ramachandra, the elder son, started living

separately. There were differences between the mother and

son. The latter had suffered a loss in the business and had

mortgaged the house with one Shinde, who filed a suit, and

obtained a decree but Vishnu filed a suit for partition

claiming that his onethird share was not affected. Before

this, Ramachandra had closed his business in 195 1, and

joined the military. He was posted at different places, but

in spite of their differences, mother and son used to

correspond with each other. In May, 1956, Laxmibai arranged

and performed his marriage, and he went away in June, 1956.

Laxmibai had contracted tuberculosis after the birth of

Purushottam. That was about twenty years before her death.

The lesion, however, healed and till 1946 her health was not

bad. From 1946 she suffered from diabetes. In 1948 she was

operated for hysterectomy, and before her operation, she was

getting hysterical fits. On June 15, 1950, she was examined

by Dr, R. V, Sathe, who prescribed some treatment. In July,

1950, she was admitted in the Wanless Tuberculosis Sana-

torium for pulmonary affection, and she was treated till

November 15, 1950. Two stages of thoracoplasty operations

were performed, but she left, though a third stage of

operation was advised. In the operations, her leftside

first rib and portions of 2nd to 6th ribs were removed.

Laxmibai was, however, treated with medicines, and the

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focus, it appears, was under control.

We now come to the events immediately preceding her death.

Laxmibai had, through the appellant, taken an appointment

from Dr. Sathe of Bombay for

464

a consultation about her health, for November 13, 1956, at

3-30 p. m. It was to attend this appointment that she left

Poona in the company of the appellant by Passenger train

on the night of November 12,1956, for Bombay. The train

arrived at Victoria Terminus Station at 5-10 a. m. thirty-

five minutes late. It is an admitted fact that Laxmibai was

then deeply unconcious and was carried on a stretcher by the

appellant to a taxi and later to the G. T. Hospital, where

she was entered as an in-door patient at 5-45 a. m. She

never regained consciousness and died at 11-30 a. m. Her

body remained it the G.T. Hospital till the evening of the

14th, when it was sent to the J. J. Hospital morgue for

preservation. Later, it was to be handed over under the

orders of the Coroner to the Grant Medical College for the

use of Medical Students. It was noticed there that she had

a suspicious ligature mark on the neck, and the body was

subjected to postmortem examination and the viscera to

chemical analysis and then the body was disposed of. Both

the autopsy as well as the chemical analysis failed to

disclose any poison and the mark on the neck was found to be

postmortem.

The appellant was the medical attendant and friend of the

family. He and his brother (also a medical practitioner)

attended on Anant Ramachandra Karve till his death. The

appellant also treated Purshottam alias Arvind for two days

prior to his death on January 18, 1954. He was also the

medical attendant of Laxmibai and generally managed her

affairs. In 1955, he started living in the main room of the

suite occupied by Laxmibai, and if Ramachandra is to be

believed, the reason for the quarrel between Laxmibai and

himself was the influence which the appellant exercised over

the mother to the disadvantage of the son. However that be,

it is quite clear that the son left Poona in June, 1956, and

did not see his mother alive again.

The death of Laxmibai was not known to the relatives or

friends. The appellant also did not disclose this fact to

any one. On the other hand, he kept it a close secret.

Soon afterwards, people began receiving

465

mysterious letters purporting to be from Laxmibai, stating

that she had gone on pilgrimage, that she did not intend to

return and that none should try to find her whereabouts.

She advised them to communicate with her through the

newspaper " Sakal ". Laxmibai also exhorted all persons to

forget her, as she had married one Joshi and had settled at

Rathodi, near Jaipur in Rajasthan. People who went to her

rooms at first found them locked, but soon the doors were

open and the meveable property was found to have been

removed. Through these mysterious letters Laxmibai informed

all concerned that she had herself removed these articles

secretly and that none was to be blamed or suspected. It is

the prosecution case that these letters were forgeries, and

that the appellant misappropriated the properties of

Laxmibai, including her shares, bank deposits etc.

The appellant has admitted his entire conduct after the

death of Laxmibai, by which he managed to get hold of her

property. His explanation was that he would have given the

proceeds to some charitable institution according to her

wishes adding some money of his own to round off the figure.

He led no evidence to prove that Laxmibai before she left

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Poona or at any time gave such instructions to him in the

matter. -

Meanwhile, the continued disappearance of Laxmibai was

causing uneasiness to her friends and relatives. On

December 31, 1957, G. D. Bhave (P. W. 8) addressed a

complaint to the Chief Minister, Bombay. Similarly , Dr. G.

N. Datar (P. W. 5) also addressed a letter to the Chief

Minister, Bombay on February 16, 1958, and in both these

petitions, doubts were expressed. Ramachandra too made a

report, and in consequence of a preliminary investigation,

the appellant was arrested on March 12,1958. He was

subsequently tried and convicted by the Sessions Judge,

Poona. His appeal was also dismissed, and the certificate

of fitness having been refused, he obtained special leave

from this Court and filed this appeal.

The appellant's contention in this appeal is that the

prosecution has not succeeded in proving that

466

Laxmibai was poisoned at all, or that there was any poison

administered to her which would evade detection, yet cause

death in the manner it actually took place. The appellant

contends also that his conduct before the death of Laxmibai

was bona fide and correct, that no inference of guilt can be

drawn from all the circumstances of this case, and that his

subsequent conduct, though suggestive of greed, was not

proof of his guilt on the charge of murder.

The conviction of the appellant rests on circumstantial

evidence, and his guilt has been inferred from medical

evidence regarding the death of Laxmibai and his conduct.'

The two Courts below have held that the total evidence in

this case unerringly points to the commission of the crime

charged and every reasonable hypothesis compatible with the

innocence of the appellant has been successfully repelled.

A criminal trial, of course, is not an enquiry into the

conduct of an accused for any purpose other than to

determine whether he is guilty of the offence charged. In

this connection, that piece of conduct can be held to be

incriminatory which has no reasonable explanation except on

the hypothesis that he is guilty. Conduct which destroys the

presumption of innocence can alone be considered as

material. The contention of the appellant, briefly, is that

the medical evidence is inconclusive, and that his-conduct

is explainable on hypotheses other than his guilt.

Ordinarily, it is not the practice of this Court to re-

examine the findings of fact reached by the High Court

particularly in a case where there is concurrence of opinion

between the two Courts below. But the case against the

appellant is entirely based on circumstantial evidence, and

there is no direct evidence that he administered a poison,

and no poison has, in fact been detected by the doctor, who

performed the postmortem examination, or by the Chemical

Analyser. The inference of guilt having been drawn on an

examination of a mass of evidence during which subsidiary

findings were given by the two Courts below, we have felt it

necessary, in view of the extraordinary nature of this case,

to satisfy ourselves

467

whether each conclusion on the separate' aspects of the

case, is supported by evidence and is just and proper.

Ordinarily, this Court is not required to enter into an

elaborate examination of the evidence, but we have departed

from this rule in this particular case, in view of the

variety of arguments that were addressed to us and the

evidence of conduct which the appellant has sought to

explain away on hypotheses suggesting innocence. These

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arguments, as we have stated in brief, covered both the

factual as well as the medical aspects of the case, and have

necessitated a close examination of the evidence once again,

so that we may be in a position to say what are the facts

found, on which our decision is rested.

That Laxmibai died within six hours of her admission in the

G. T. Hospital is not questioned. Her body was identified

by persons who knew her well from her photograph taken at

the J. J. Hospital on November 19, 1956. In view of the

contention of the appellant that she died of disease and/or

wrong treatment, we have to determine first what was the

state of her health before she went on the ill-fated

journey. ,This enquiry takes us to the medical papers

maintained at the institutions where she was treated in the

past, the evidence of some of the doctors who dealt with her

case, of the observation of witnesses who could depose to

her outward state of health immediately before her

departure, and lastly, the case papers maintained by the

appellant as a medical adviser.

The earliest record of Laxmibai's health is furnished by Dr.

K. C. Gharpure (P. W. 17), who treated her in 1948.

According to Dr. Gharpure, she entered his Nursing Home on

April 6, 1948, and stayed there till April 24, 1948.

Laxmibai was then suffering from Menorrhagia and

Metrorrhagia for about six years. In 1946 there was an

operation for dilatation and also curettage. She had

Diabetes from 1945 and hysterical fits since 1939. On

admission in Dr. Gharpure's Nursing Home, her blood pressure

was found to be 140/80 and urine showed sugar + + , albumin

nil. She was kept in the hospital and probably treated, and

on the 11th, when a sub-total

468

hysterectomy was performed, she had blood pressure 110/75

and sugar traces (albumin nil) before the Laguoperation.

According to Dr. Gharpure, the operation was not for

hysterical fits, and along with hysterectomy the right

-ovary was cysticpunctured and the appendix was also

removed. A certificate was issued by Dr. Gharpure (Ex.

121), in which the same history is given.

Laxmibai was next examined by Dr. Ramachandra Sathe

(P.W.25) on June 15, 1950. He deposed from the case file

which he had maintained about her complaints. A copy of the

case papers shows that she was introduced to him by the

appellant. At that time, her weight was 120 lbs. and her

blood pressure, 140/90. Dr. Sathe noticed that diabetes had

existed for four years, and that she was being given insulin

for 8 months prior to his examination. He also noticed

hysterectomy scar, and that she had a tubercular lesion on

the left apex 20 years ago. According to the statement of

the patient, she had trouble with tuberculosis from May

1949, and her teeth were extracted on account of pyorrhoea.

She was getting intermittent temperature from September

1949, and was receiving streptomycin and PAS irregularly.

She was then suffering from low temperature, slight cough

and expectoration. On examination, the doctor found that

there was infiltration in the left apex but no other septic

focus was found. The evidence does not show the treatment

which was given, and the doctor merely stated that he must

have recommended a line of treatment to the patient, though

he had no record of it.

On July 13, 1950, Laxmibai entered the Wanlesswadi T. B.

Sanatorium, and stayed there till November 15, 1950. Her

condition is noted in two certificates which were issued by

the Sanatorium -and proved by Dr. Fletcher (P. W. 16), the

Medical Superintendent. In describing the previous history

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of the patient, the case papers showed that she had a

history of Pott's disease (T. B. of the spine) 20 years

before. She had diabetes for five years and history of

hysterectomy operation two years before. It was also noted

that she had

469

T. B. of the lungs 15 years back, but had kept well for 14

years and a new attack began in or about 1949. The

certificate describes the treatment given to her in these

words:

" Patient was admitted on 13th July, 1950. X-Ray on

admission showed extensive filtration on the left side with

a large cavity in the upper zone; the right side was within

normal limits. She had diabetes with high blood sugar which

was controlled by insulin. Two stages of thoracoplasty

operations on the left side were done and there was good

clearing of disease but there was a small residual cavity

seen and the third stage operation was advised. The patient

is leaving at her own request against medical advice. Her

sputum is positive. "

From the above, it appears that Laxmibai's general

complaints were menstrual irregularities corrected by

hysterectomy, tuberculosis of the lungs controlled to a

large extent by thoracoplasty and medicines and diabetes for

which she was receiving treatment. In the later case

papers, there is no mention of hysterical fits, and it seems

that she had overcome that trouble after the performance of

hysterectomy and the cysticpuncture of the ovary, for there

is no evidence of a recurrence after 1948. Diabetes was,

however, present, and must have continued till her death.

Next, we come to the evidence of some witnesses who saw her

immediately prior to her departure for Bombay on November

12, 1956. The first witness in this connection is

Ramachandra (P.W. 1), son of Laxmibai. He has given

approximately the same description of her many ailments and

the treatment she underwent. He last saw her in June, 1956,

when his marriage was performed. According to him, the

general condition of his mother was rather weak, but before

that, her condition had not occasioned him any concern and

he had not noticed anything so radically wrong with her as

to prompt him to ask her about her ailments. When he last

saw his mother in June 1956, lie found her in good health.

Dr. Madhav Domadhar Bhave (P.W. 9), who knew Laxmibai

470

intimately stated that he saw her last in the month of

October, 1956, and that the condition of her health was

good. No question was asked from him in cross examination at

all. His brother, G. D. Bhave, (P.W. 8), who is a landlord,

had gone to Laxmibai's house on November 8, 1956, and met

her in the presence of the appellant. Laxmibai had then

told him that she was going to Bombay with the appellant to

consult Dr. Sathe in connection with her health. She had

also stated that she would be returning in four or five

days. According to the witness, she was in good health, and

was moving about and doing her own work. The next witness

is Champutai Vinayak Gokhale (P.W. II), who met Laxmibai on

November 10 or 11, 1956. Champutai is a well-educated lady.

She is a B.Sc. of the Bombay University and an M.A. of

Columbia (U.S.A.) University. She said that she had gone to

Laxmibai's house to invite her for the birthday party of her

son, which was to take place on November 13, 1956. She

found Laxmibai in good state of health, and Laxmibai

promised that though she would be going to Bombay, she would

return soon enough to join the party.

Similarly, Viswanath Janardhan Karandikar, pleader of Poona,

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met Laxmibai on November 10 or,11 , 1956. Laxmibai had

herself gone in the afternoon to him to ask him whether her

presence was necessary in Poona in connection with the suit

filed by Vishnu, to which we have referred earlier. The

witness stated that Laxmibai was in good state of health 'at

that time, and that he informed her that he did not propose

to examine her as a witness. She was again seen by

Dattatreya Vishnu Virkar (P.W. 6) on the night of November

12, 1956, an hour before she left her house for Bombay.

Virkar, who is a Graduate in Electrical Mechanics and in

Government service, was a tenant living in the same house.

Laxmibai, according to the will of her husband, was entitled

to Rs. 50 out of the rents from tenants. She went to

Virkar's Block at 8 p.m. and told him that she was going to

Bombay to consult a doctor in the company of the appellant

and needed money. Virkar gave her Rs. 50 and

471

Laxmibai went back to her Block saying that she would give a

receipt. Later, she brought the receipt to Virkar seated at

his meals, asked him not to get UP and left the receipt in

his room. The receipt signed by Laxmibai is Ex. 70, and is

dated November 12, 1956. Shantabai (P.W. 14), a servant of

Laxmibai, was deaf and dumb, and her evidence was

interpreted with the help of Martand Ramachandra Jamdar

(P.W. 13), the Principal of a Deaf and Mute School. It

appears that Shantabai had studied Marathi, and was able to

answer questions written on a piece of paper, replies to

which questions she wrote in her own hand. Some of the

questions were not properly answered by Shantabai, but she

stated by pantomime that on the day on which she left, the

appellant had given two injections to Laxmibai. The learned

Sessions Judge made a note to the following effect:

In the morning the accused gave Laxmibai one injection and

in the evening he gave the second one. (The signs were so

clear that I myself gathered the meaning and the interpreter

was not asked to interpret the signs). "

Next, Laxmibai was seen by Pramilabai Sapre (P.W. 12) at 8

p.m. on November 12,1956. Laxmibai had told the witness

that she was going to Bombay to consult a doctor and

Laxmibai again' passed her door at 9-15 p.m., when the

witness was at her meals. Though Laxmibai told her not to

disturb herself, the witness did get up and saw her. The

witness stated that Laxmibai did not suffer from T. B. after

the ,operation but was suffering from diabetes, and that she

sometimes used to give Laxmibai her injections of insulin

but only till 1953. The last witness on the state of

Laxmibai's health is K. L. Patil (P. W. 60), who saw

Laxmibai immediately before her departure for the station.

He saw her standing at the Par in front of her house with a

small bag and a small bedding. He then saw the appellant

arriving there, and Laxmibai presumably left in a rickshaw

or a tonga, because there was a stand for these vehicles in

the neighbourhood. All this evidence was not questioned

except to point out-that Dr. Datar in his petition to the

Chief Minister had stated that Laxmibai was a

472

frank case of tuberculosis of both lungs and an invalid(Ex.

68). But Dr. Datar explained that he had so stated there,

because it was being " circulated " that she had gone on a

long pilgrimage alone, and that it was most improbable.

Indeed, Dr. Datar said that Laxmibai was well enough to do

all her work and even cooked for herself.

From this mass of evidence given by persons from different

walks of life and most of them well-placed, it is clear

enough that Laxmibai was not in such a state of health that

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she would have collapsed in the train, unless something very

unusual took place. She was not in the moribund state in

which she undoubtedly was, when she reached the hospital.

Her general health, though not exactly good, had not

deteriorated so radically as to prevent her from attending

to her normal avocations. She appeared to have been quite

busy prior to her departure arranging for this matter and

that, and she did not rely upon other persons' help but

personally attended to all that she desired. Right up to 9-

15 or so in the night, she was sufficiently strong and

healthy to go about her affairs, and indeed, she must have

boarded the train also in a fit state of health, because

there is nothing to show that she was carried to the

compartment in a state of collapse or unconsciousness.

We have stated earlier that the appellant who was

presumably treating her for her ailments had maintained case

papers to show what treatment he was giving her from time to

time. These case, papers are Ex.' 305, and commence on

February 27, 1956. The medicines that have been shown as

prescribed in these case papers show treatment for diabetes,

general debility, tuberculosis, rheumatism and indigestion.

Much reliance cannot, however, be placed upon this document,

because these case papers significantly enough stop on

November 12,-1956, and continue again from February 13,

1957, when Laxmibai was no more. There are four entries of

treatment given to Laxmibai between February 13 and February

28, 1957, when Laxmibai had already died and her body had

undergone postmortem examination and been cremated.

473

The extent to which her treatment, if any, went in the

period covered by the case papers may or may not be truly

described by the appellant in these papers, but we are

definitely of the opinion that the entries there cannot be

read without suspicion, in view of the extraordinary fact

described by us here. It appears, however, that the last

insulin injection was given to her on September 27, 1956,

though the appellant stated in his examination as accused in

the case that she was put on Nadisan tablets for diabetes.

The appellant was questioned by the Sessions Judge as to the

State of her health, and he stated that Laxmibai on the day

she left for Bombay had a temperature of 100 degrees and was

suffering from laryngitis, pharyngitis, and complained of

pain in the ear. What relevance this has, we shall point

out subsequently when we deal with the medical evidence and

the conclusions of the doctors about it.

The next question which falls for consideration is whether

the appellant and Laxmibai travelled in the same compartment

on the train. The train left Poona at 10 p.m., and it is

obvious enough that it was a comparatively slow and

inconvenient train. We have no evidence in the case as to

whether the appellant travelled with Laxmibai in the same

compartment, but both the Courts below have found from the

probabilities of the case that he did. The best person to

tell us about this journey is necessarily the appellant, and

reference may now be made to what he stated in regard to

this journey. The appellant had arranged for the

examination of Laxmibai by Dr. Sathe at Bombay. He was the

family physician and also a friend. Laxmibai was an elderly

lady and the appellant was for some time previous to this

journey living in the main room of her block. There would

be nothing to prevent the appellant from travelling in the

same compartment with his patient, who might need his

attention during the journey. The appellant denied in Court

that he had travelled in the same compartment, but his

statements on this part of the events have not been quite

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consistent. After Laxmibai died and the question arose

about the disposal of her body, the police at

474

Poona were asked to contact the appellant to get some

information about her. On November 16, 1956, before any

investigation into ail offence of any kind was started, the

appellant was questioned by the police, and he gave a

written statement in Ex. 365. He stated there as follows:

"I, Anant Chintaman Lagu, occupation Medical practitioner,

age 40 years, residing at H. No. 431/5, Shukrawar and

dispensary at H. No. 20, Shukrawar Peth, Poona 2, on being

questioned, state that on the night of 12th November, 1956,

1 left Poona for Bombay by the train which leaves Poona at

10 p.m. I reached Victoria Terminus at 5-15 a.m. on 13th

November, 1956. In my compartment I bad a talk with a woman

as also with other passengers. On getting accomodation in

the train almost all of us began to doze and at about 12

p.m. we slept. As Byculla came, -we started preparations

for getting down. At that time one woman was found fast

asleep. From other passengers I came to know that her name

was Indumati Panse, about 36 years old and she had a brother

serving in Calcutta. Other passengers got down at V. T. The

woman, however, did not awake. 1, therefore, looked at her

keenly and found that she was senseless. Being myself a

doctor, I thought it my duty to take her to the hospital.

I, therefore, took her to the G.T. Hospital in a taxi. I

know that that hospital was near. As I had taken the said

woman to the hospital, the C.M.O. took my address. I have

no more information about the woman. She is not my relation

and I am not in any way responsible for her."

It will appear from this that he was travelling in the

same compartment as Laxmibai, though for reason's of his own

he did not care to admit that he was taking her to Bombay.

Similarly, in the hospital when he was questioned about the

patient he had brought for admission, he stated to Dr. Ugale

(P. W. 18), Casualty Medical Officer, that the lady had

suddenly become unconscious in the train. This fact was

noted by Dr. Ugale in the bed-head ticket, and Dr. Ugale has

stated on oath that the information was supplied by

475

the appellant himself. To Dr. Miss Aneeja, who was the

House Physician on the morning of November 13, the appellant

also stated the same thing. Dr. Miss Aneeja had also made a

separate note of this, and stated that the information was

given by the appellant. In view of these statements 'made

by the appellant at a time when he was not required to face

a charge, we think that his present statement in Court that

he travelled in a separate compartment cannot be accepted.

The train halted at various stations en route, and evidence

was led in the case, of the Guard, K. Shamanna (P. W. 37),

who deposed from his memo book (Ex. 214). This train made

26 halts en route before it arrived at V. T. Station. Some

of these halts were of as many as 20 minutes. It is

difficult to think that the appellant would not have known

till he arrived at Victoria Terminus that his patient was

unconscious, and the fact that he mentioned that she became

suddenly unconscious shows that be knew the exact manner of

the onset. Without, however; speculating as to what had

actually happened, it is quite clear to us that Laxmibai was

in the same compartment as the appellant, a fact which was

not denied by the learned counsel in the arguments before

us. If we were to accept what the appellant stated as true,

then Laxmibai lost her consciousness suddenly. It is,

however, a little difficult to accept as true all that the

appellant stated in this behalf, because be told a patent

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lie to the police when he was questioned, that he knew

nothing about the woman or Who she was, but took her to the

hospital as an act of humanity when he found her

unconscious. There is nothing to show beyond this statement

to the police in Ex. 365 that there were other passengers in

the compartment; but if there had been, the attention of

these passengers would have been drawn to the condition of

Laxmibai, and some' one would have advised the calling of

the Guard or the railway authorities at one of these

stations at which the train halted. The circumstances of

the case, therefore, point to the appellant and Laxmibai

being in the compartment together, and the preponderance of

476

probabilities is that the compartment was not occupied by

any other person.

We shall leave out from consideration for the present

the circumstances under which Laxmibai was admitted

in the G. T. Hospital and the treatment given to her. We

shall now pass on to her death and what happened thereafter

and the connection of the appellant with the circumstances

resulting in the disposal of the dead body. We have already

stated that the appellant was present in the hospital till

her death. We next hear of the appellant at Poona. On the

afternoon of November 13, 1956, Dr' Mouskar (P. W. 40), the

Resident Medical Officer of the Hospital, sent a telegram

(Ex. 224) to the appellant, and it conveyed to him the

following information:

" Indumati expired. Arrange removal reply immediately." The

telegram was sent at about 2 p.m. The appellant in reply did

not send a telegram, but wrote an inland letter in which he

stated that the name of the woman admitted by him in the

hospital had been wrongly shown as "Paunshe", and that there

was an extra "u" in it. He also stated that he had informed

her brother at Calcutta about the death, and that the

brother would call at the hospital for the body of his

sister. The name of the brother was shown as Govind Vaman

Deshpande. The letter also stated that the appellant was

writing in connection with the woman aged 30 to 35 years

admitted in the hospital at 6 a.m. on November 13, 1955, and

who had expired the same day at 11 a.m. The name of the

brother in this letter is fictitious, because Laxmibai bad

no brother, much less a brother in Calcutta and of this

name. Thereafter, the appellant took no further action in

the matter till the police questioned him on the 16th, two

days after he had sent the letter. It seems that the appel-

lant did not expect the police to appear so soon, and he

thought it advisable to deny all knowledge about the lady he

had taken to the hospital by telling the police that he did

not know her. The inference drawn from these two pieces of

conduct by the Courts below is against the appellant, and we

also agree. We have already stated that from then onwards,

the

477

appellant did not care to enquire from the hospital

authorities as to what had happened to his patient's dead

body, and whether it had been disposed Of or not. He also

did not go to Bombay, nor did he inform Dr. Sathe about the

cancellation of the appointment. In his examination, he,

however, stated that he attempted to telephone to Dr. Sathe,

but could not get through, as the instrument was engaged on

each occasion. One expects, however, that he would have in

the ordinary course written a letter of apology to Dr.

Sathe, because he must have been conscious of the fact that

he had kept the Specialist waiting for this appointment; but

he did not. It is said that the appellant need not have

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taken this appointment and could have told a lie to

Laxmibai; but the appointment with Dr. Sathe had to be real

because if the plan failed, Laxmibai would have been most

surprised why she was brought to Bombay. With this ends the

phase of events resulting in the death of Laxmibai. We

shall deal with the events in the hospital later, but we

pursue the thread of the appellant's conduct.

Prior to the fateful journey, Laxmibai had passed two

documents to the appellant. They are Exs. 285 and 286. By

the first, Laxmibai intimated the Bank of Maharashtra,

Poona, that she was going to withdraw in the following week

from her Savings Bank account a sum of money between Rs.

1,000 and Rs. 5,000. The other document was a bearer cheque

for Rs. 5,000, also signed by Laxmibai but written by the

appellant. The appellant presented the first on November 17

after writing the date, November 15, on it and the second on

November 20, after writing the date, November 19, and

received payment. Prior to this, on November 12, 1956, when

Laxmibai was alive and in Poona he had presented to the Bank

of Maharashtra a dividend warrant for Rs. 2,607-6-0 to

Laxmibai's account writing her signature himself. This was

hardly necessary if he was honest. The signature deceived

the Bank, and it is obvious that he was a consummate forger

even then. Of course, he put the money into Laxmibai's

account, but he had to if he was to draw it out again on the

strength of these 61

478

two documents. The question is, can we say that he was

honest on November 12, 1956? The answer is obvious. His

dishonest intentions were, therefore, fully matured even

before he left Poona. Thereafter, the appellant converted

all the property of Laxmibai to his own use. He removed the

movables in her rooms including the pots and pans,

furniture, clothes, radio, share scrips and so on, to his

own house. He even went to the length of forging her

signature on securities, transfer deeds, letters to banks

and companies, and even induced a lady magistrate to

authenticate the signature of Laxmibai for which he obtained

the services of a woman who, to say the least, personated

Laxmibai. So clever were the many ruses and so cunning the

forgeries that the banks, companies and indeed, all persons

were completely deceived. It was only once that the bank

had occasion to question the signature of Laxmibai, but the

appellant promptly presented another document purporting to

be signed by Laxmibai, which the bank accepted with somewhat

surprising credulity. The long and short of it is that

numerous persons were imposed upon, including those who are

normally careful and suspicious, and the appellant by these

means collected a sum of no less than Rs. 26,000 which he

disposed of in various ways, the chief, among them being the

opening of a short term deposit account in the name of his

wife and himself and crediting some other amounts to the

joint names of his brother, B.C. Lagu, and himself. We do

not enter into the details of his many stratagems for two

reasons. Firstly because, all this conduct has been

admitted before us by his counsel, and next because he has

received life imprisonment on charges connected with these

frauds.Suffice it to say that if the appellant were to be

found guilty of the offence, sufficient motive would be

found in his dealings with the property of this unfortunate

widow after her death. If murder there was,it was to

facilitate the action which he took regarding her property.

If the finding of his guilt be reached, then his subsequent

conduct would be a part of a very deepseated plan beginning

almost from the time when he

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479

began to ingratiate himself into the good opinion of the

lady. The fact, however, remains that all this conduct

cannot avail the prosecution, unless it proves conclusively

some other aspects of the case.

We cannot, however, overlook one or two other circumstances

which are part of this conduct. We have already stated

briefly that the appellant cause all persons to believe that

Laxmibai was alive and living at Rathodi as the happily

married wife of one Joshi. Both Joshi and Rathodi were

equally fictitious. In this connection, the pleader, the

son, the friends and the relations of Laxmibai were

receiving for months after her death letters and

communications purporting to be signed by her, though

written at the instance of the -appellant by persons, who

have come and deposed before the Court to this fact. These

letters were all posted in R. M. S. vans, and the

prosecution has successfully proved that they were not

posted in any of the regular post offices in a town or

village. These letters show a variety of details and

intimacies which made them appear genuine except for the

handwriting and the signature of Laxmibai. For a time,

people who received them, though suspicious, took them for

what they were worth, and it appears that they did not worry

very much about the truth. -It has now been successfully

proved by the prosecution and admitted -by the appellant's

counsel before us that these letters were all sent by the

appellant with the sole object of keeping the people in the

dark about the fact of death, so that the appellant might

have time to deal with the property at leisure. The

appellant asserts that he thought of this only after the

death of Laxmibai. It seems somewhat surprising that the

appellant should have suddenly gone downhill into

dishonesty, so to speak, at a bound. The maxim is very old

that no one becomes dishonest suddenly; nema fuit repente

turpissimus. What inference can be drawn from his conduct

after the death of Laxmibai is a matter to be considered by

us. And in this connection, we can only say at this stage

that if some prior conduct is connected intrinsically, with

conduct after death, then the motive of the appellant would

be very clear indeed.

480

We now pass on to the evidence of what happened in the

hospital and the total medical evidence on the cause of

death. This evidence has to be considered from different

angles. Much of it relates to the condition of Laxmibai and

the treatment given to her; but other parts of it relate to

the conduct of the appellant and the information supplied by

him. There is also further evidence about the disposal of

the body and the enquiries made into the cause of death.

These must be dealt with separately. For the present, we

shall confine ourselves to the pure medical aspect of the

case of Laxmibai during her short stay in the hospital.

When Laxmibai was admitted in the hospital, Dr. Ugale

(P.W.18), the Casualty Medical Officer, was in charge. He

made a preliminary examination and recorded his impressions

before he sent the patient to Ward No. 12. He obtained from

the appellant the history of the attack, and it appears that

all that the appellant told him was " Patient suddenly

became unconscious in train while coining from up country.

History of similar attacks frequently before". It also

appears that the appellant told him that the lady was liable

to hysterical fits, and that was set down by Dr. Ugale as a

provisional diagnosis. So much of Dr. Ugale's evidence

regarding the health of Laxmibai as given by the appellant.

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Now, we take up his own examination. According to Dr.

Ugale, there were involuntary movements of the right hand,

which he noticed only once. Only the right hand was moving.

He found corneal reflex absent. Pupils were normal and

reacting to light. So far as central nervous system and

respiration were concerned, he detected nothing abnormal.

According to him, there was no evidence of a hysterical fit,

and he stated that he queried that provisional diagnosis

which, according to him, was supplied by the appellant.

According to Dr. Ugale, the name of the patient was given as

lndumati Paunshe.

The patient was then made over to the care of Dr. Miss

Aneeja (P. W. 19). Dr. Miss Aneeja was then a raw Medical

Graduate, having passed the M.B.B.S. in June, 1956. She was

working as the House Physician,

481

and was in charge of Ward No. 12. She was summoned from her

quarters to the Ward at 6-15 a.m. and she examined Laxmibai.

We leave out of account again the conversation bearing upon

the conduct of the appellant, which we shall view

subsequently. He told her also about the sudden onset of

unconsciousness, and that there was a history of similar

attacks before. We are concerned next with the result of

the examination by Dr. Miss Aneeja, bearing in mind that she

was not a very experienced physician. She found pulse 100,

temperature 99-5, respiration 20. The skin was found to be

smooth and elastic nails, conjunctiva and tongue were pink

in colour lymphatic glands were not palpable; and bones and

joints had nothing abnormal in them. The pupils of the eyes

were equal but dilated, and were not then reacting to light.

She found that up to the abdomen and the sphincter the

reflexes were absent. The reflexes at knee and ankle were

normal, but the plantar reflex was Babinsky on one foot, and

there was slight rigidity of the neck.

It appears that Laxmibai was promptly given a dose of a

stimulant and oxygen was started. Dr. Miss. Aneeja also

stated that she gave an injection of insulin (40 units)

immediately. Much dispute has arisen as to whether Dr. Miss

Aneeja examined the urine for sugar, albumin and acetone

before starting this treatment. It is clear, however, from

her testimony that no blood test was made to determine the

level of sugar in the blood. A lumbar puncture was also

made by Dr. Miss Aneeja and the cerebro-spinal fluid was

sent for chemical analysis. That report is available, and

the fluid was normal. According to Dr. Miss Aneeja, the

Medical Registrar who, she says, was Dr. Saify, recommended

intravenous injection of 40 units of insulin with 20 C.C. of

glucose, which were administered. According to her,

Laxmibai was also put on glucose intragastric drip.

Dr. Miss Aneeja stated that the urine was examined by her

three times, and in the first sample, sugar and acetone were

present in quantities. The first examination, according to

her, was at 6-30 a.m., the next at 8-30 a.m. and the last at

11 a.m. She stated that she

482

had used Benedict test for sugar and Rothera's test for

acetone. In all the examinations, according to her, there

was no albumin present. Dr. Miss Aneeja also claims to have

phoned to Dr. Variava, the Honorary Physician, at 6-45 or 7

a.m., and consulted him about the case. According to her,

Dr. Saify, the Registrar of the Unit, visited the Ward at 8-

30 a.m. and wrote on the case papers that an intravenous

injection of 40 units of insulin with 20 C.C. of glucose

should be administered. According to her, Dr. Variava

visited the Ward at 11 a.m., and examined Laxmibai, but the

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patient expired at 11-30 a.m. We do not at this stage refer

to the instructions for postmortem examination left by Dr.

Variava which were noted on the case papers, because that is

a matter with regard to the disposal of the dead body, and

we shall deal with the evidence in that behalf separately.

The evidence of Dr. Miss Aneeja shows only this much that

she was put in charge of this case, examined urine three

times and finding sugar and acetone present, she started a

treatment by insulin which was also supplemented by

administration of glucose intravenously as well as by

intragastric drip. Apart from one dose of stimulant given

in the first few minutes, no other treatment beyond

administration of oxygen was undertaken. She had also noted

the observations of the reflexes and the condition of the

patient as they appeared to her on examination.

There is a considerable amount of contradiction between the

evidence of Dr, Miss Aneeja and that of Dr. Variava as to

whether acetone was found by Dr. Miss Aneeja before Dr.

Variava's visit. According to the learned Judges of the

Court below, the first urine examination deposed to by Dr.

Miss Aneeja and said to have been made at 6-30 a.m. was

never performed. The other two examinations were made, as

the urine chart (Ex. 127) shows. It is, however, a question

whether they were confined only to sugar and albumin but did

not include examination for acetone. We shall discuss this

point after we have dealt with the evidence of Dr. Variava.

483

Dr. Variava (P.W. 21) was the Honorary Physician, and was in

charge of this Unit. According to him, he went on his

rounds at 11 a.m., and examined Laxmibai from 11 a.m. to 11-

15 a.m. He questioned Dr. Miss Aneeja about the line of

treatment and told her that she could not have made a

diagnosis of diabetic coma without examining urine for

acetone. Dr. Variava deposed that the entry regarding

acetone on the case papers was not made when he saw the

papers at 11 a.m. He then asked Dr. Miss Aneeja to take by

catheter a sample of the urine and to examine it for

acetone.

Dr. Miss Aneeja brought the test-tube with urine in it,

which showed a light green colour, and Dr. Variava inferred

from it that acetone might be present in traces. According

to Dr. Variava, Laxmibai's case was not one of diabetic

coma, and he gave two reasons for this diagnosis, namely,

that diabetic coma never comes on suddenly, and that there

are no convulsions in it, as were described by Dr. Ugale.

Dr. Variava also denied that the phone call to him was made

by Dr. Miss Aneeja. Dr. Variava stated that before he left

the Ward he told Dr. Miss Aneeja that he was not satisfied

that the woman had died of diabetic coma and instructed her

that postmortem examination should be asked for.

In connection with the evidence about the examination of the

urine, we have to see also the evidence of Marina Laurie,

nurse (P.W. 59), who stated how the entries in the urine

chart came to be made. It may be pointed out that the urine

chart showed only two examinations for sugar, at 8-30 a.m.

and 11 am., and not the one at 6-30 a.m. The entry about

that was made on the case papers under the head " treatment

" by Dr. Miss Aneeja, and it is the last entry I acetone + +

' which Dr. Variava stated was not on the papers at the time

he saw them. Indeed, Dr. Variava would not have roundly

questioned Dr. Miss Aneeja about the examination for

acetone, if this entry had been there, and Dr. Miss Aneeja

admits a portion of Dr. Variava's statement when she says

that she examined the urine on Dr. Variava's instructions

and

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484

brought the test-tube to him, in which the urine was of a

light green colour.

Now, the urine chart does not show an examination of the

urine at 6-30 a.m. According to Dr. Miss Aneeja, she

examined the urine, carried the impression of colour in her

mind, and noted the result on the case papers. She was

questioned why she adopted the unusual course, but stated

that it often happened that the urine chart was not prepared

and the result was not taken to the case papers. However it

be, Dr. Variava is quite positive that the entry about

acetone did not exist on the case papers, and an examination

of the original shows differences in ink and pen which would

not have been there, bad all the three items been written at

the same time. It also appears that even at 8-30 a.m. the

urine was examined for sugar only because the entry in the

urine chart shows brick-red colour which is the resulting

colour in Benedict test and not in Rothera's test.

Similarly, at II a.m. the urine chart shows only a test for

sugar because the light green colour is not the resulting

colour of Rothera's test but also of the Benedict test.

Indeed, Dr. Variava was also shown a test-tube containing

the urine of slight greenish colour, and his own inference

was that acetone might be present in traces. There is thus

nothing to show that Dr. Miss Aneeja embarked upon a

treatment for diabetic coma after ascertaining the existence

of acetone. All the circumstances point to the other

conclusion, namely, that she did not examine the urine for

acetone' and that seems to be the cause of the questions put

by Dr. Variava to her. We have no hesitation, therefore, in

accepting Dr. Variava's evidence on this part of the case,

which is supported by the evidence of the course, the urine

chart and the interpolation in the case papers.

From all that we have said, it is quite clear that the

treatment given to her for diabetic coma was based on

insufficient data. There was also no Kussmaul breathing

(Root & White, Diabetes Mellitus, p. 118); her breathing was

20 per minute which was normal. Nor was there any sign of

dehydration,

485

because the skin was smooth and elastic, and the Babinsky

sign was a contra indication of diabetic coma. This is

borne out by the diagnosis of Dr. Variava himself, who

appears positive that Laxmibai did not suffer from diabetic

coma, and is further fortified by the reasons given by Dr.

H. Mehta (P.W. 65), to whose evidence we shall have occasion

to refer later.

Two other doctors from the hospital were examined in

connection with Laxmibai's stay. The first was Dr. J. C.

Patel, who was then the Medical Registrar of Unit No. 1. It

seems that Dr. Saify, the permanent Medical Registrar, was

on leave due to the illness of his father, and Dr. J. C.

Patel was looking after his Unit. Dr. J. C. Patel went

round with Dr. Variava at 11 a.m., and in his presence, Dr.

Variava examined Laxmibai. He has no contribution to make,

because he says he does not remember anything. The only

piece of evidence which he has given and which is useful for

our enquiry is that in the phone book (Ex. 323) in which all

calls are entered, no call to Dr. Variava on the morning of

the 13th was shown. The evidence of Dr. J. C. Patel is thus

useless, except in this little respect. The other doctor,

Dr. Hiralal Shah (P. W. 72) was the Registrar of Unit No.

2. After Laxmibai entered the hospital, Dr. Miss Aneeja sent

a call to him, and he signed the call book (Ex. 322). Dr.

Hiralal Shah pretended that he did not remember the case.

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He stated that if he was called, he must have gone there,

and examined the patient; but he stated in the witness-box

that he did not remember anything. All the three doctors,

Dr. Miss Aneeja, Dr. Patel and Dr. Hiralal Shah, denied

having made the entry " Insulin 40 units 1. V. with 20 C. C.

glucose." Dr. Miss Aneeja says that it was written by Dr.

Saify, who, as we shall show presently, was not present in

Bombay at all on that day.

We do not propose to deal with the cause of the death,

before adverting to the findings of Dr. Jhala (P.W. 66), who

performed the autopsy and Dr. H. S. Mehta (P. W. 65), to

whom all the case papers of Laxmibai were handed over for

expert opinion. Dr. Jhala performed the postmortem

operation on November 23,

62

486

and he was helped by his assistants. Though the body was

well-preserved and had been kept in the air-conditioned

morgue, there is no denying the fact that 10 days had

passed between the death and the postmortem examination.

The findings of Dr. Jhala were that the body and the viscera

were not decomposed, and that an examination of the vital

organs could be made. Dr. Jhala found in the stomach 4 oz.

of a pasty meal and,' oz.of whitish precipitate in the

bladder. He did not find any other substance which could be

said to have been introduced into the system. He examined

the brain and found it congested. There were no marks of

injury on the body; the lungs were also congested and in the

upper lobe of the left lung there was a tubercular focus

which, in his opinion, was not sufficient to cause death

ordinarily. He also found Atheroma of aorta and slight

sclerosis of the coronary. He stated that the presence of

the last meal in the stomach indicated that there was no

vomitting. He found no pathological lesion in the pancreas,

the kidney, the liver and any other internal organ.

He gave the opinion after the receipt of the Chemical

Analyser's report that death could have occurred due to

diabetic coma.

It must be remembered that Dr. Jhala was not out to discover

whether any offence had been committed. He was making a

postmortem examination of a body which, under the Coroner's

order, had been handed over to the medical authorities with

a certificate from a hospital that death was due to diabetic

coma. It was not then a medico-legal case; the need for

postmortem had arisen, because the peon had noticed certain

marks on the neck, which had caused some suspicion. After

discovering that the mark on the neck was a postmortem

injury, all that he had to do was to verify whether the

diagnosis made by the G.T. Hospital that death was due to

diabetic coma was admissible. He examined the body, found

no other cause of death, and the Chemical Analyser not

having reported the administration of poison, he accepted

the diagnosis of the G. T. Hospital as correct. Dr. Jhala,

however, stated that there were numerous poisons which could

487

not be detected on chemical analysis even in the case of

normal, healthy and undecomposed viscera. He admitted that

his opinion that death could have occurred due to diabetic

coma was an inaccurate way of expressing his opinion.

According to him, the proper way would have been to have

given the opinion death by diabetes with complications."

As we have said, all these papers were placed before Dr. H.

S. Mehta for his expert opinion. It is to his evidence we

now turn to find out what was the cause of death of

Laxmibai. In the middle of March 1958, Dr. Mehta was

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consulted about this case, and he was handed over copies of

all the documents we have referred to in connection with the

medical evidence, together with the proceedings of the

Coroner's inquest at Bombay. According to Dr. Mehta,

opinion was sought from him about the cause of death of

'Indumati Paunshe' and whether it was from diabetic coma,

any other disease or the administration of a poison. Dr.

Mehta was categorical that it was not due to diabetic coma.

He was also of the opinion that no natural cause for the

death was disclosed by the autopsy, and according to him, it

was probably due to the administration of some

unrecognisable poison or a recognisable poison which, due to

the lapse of time, was incapable of being detected by

analysis. He gave several reasons for coming to the

conclusion that Laxmibai did not suffer from diabetic coma.

Each of his reasons is supported by citations from numerous

standard medical authorities on the subject, but it is

unnecessary to cite them once again. According to him, the

following reasons existed for holding that Laxmibai did not

suffer from diabetic coma:

(1) Convulsion never occur in diabetic coma per se.

According to Dr. Mehta, the involuntary movements described

by Dr. Ugale must be treated as convulsions or tremors. We

are of opinion that Dr. Ugale would not have made this note

on the case papers if he had not seen the involuntary

movements. No doubt, these involuntary movements had ceased

by the time the patient was carried to Ward No. 12, because

Dr. Miss Aneeja made a note that they were not observed in

488

the Ward. But Dr. Ugale was a much more experienced doctor

than Dr. Miss Aneeja, and it, is possible that Dr. Miss

Aneeja did not notice the symptoms as minutely as the

Casualty Medical Officer.

(2) Diabetic coma never occurs all of a sudden and

without a warning. There are premonitary signs and symptons

of prodromata. In the case, there is no evidence to show

how Laxmibai became unconscious. We have, however, the

statement of the appellant made both to Dr. Ugale and Dr.

Miss Aneeja that the onset was sudden. Dr. Mehta was cross-

examined with a view to eliciting that a sudden onset of

diabetic coma was possible if there was an infection of any

kind. A suggestion was put to him that if the patient

suffered from Otitis Media, then sometimes the un-

conciousness came on suddenly. It may be pointed out that

the appellant in his examination stated that on the day in

question, Laxmibai had a temperature of 100 degrees,

laryngitis, pharyngitis, and complained of pain in the ear.

That statement was made to bring his defence in line with

this suggestion. Dr. Mehta pointed out that Dr. Jhala had

opened the skull and had examined the interior organs but

found no pathological lesion there. According to Dr. Mehta,

Dr. Jhala would have detected pus in the middle ear if

Otitis Media had existed. The fact that no question

suggesting this was put to Dr. Jhala shows that the defence

is an afterthought to induce the Court to hold that death

was due to diabetic coma, or, in other words, to natural

causes. We are inclined to accept the evidence of Dr. Jhala

that he and his assistants did not discover any pathological

lesion in the head or the brain. Otitis Media would have

caused inflammation of the Eustachian tube, and pus would

have been present. No such question having been put, we

must hold that there was no septic focus which might have

induced the sudden onset of diabetic coma. It was also

suggested to Dr. Mehta that there was a tubercular infection

and sometimes in the case of tubercular infection diabetic

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coma suddenly supervened. The tuberculosis in this case was

not of such severity as to have caused this. Dr. Jhala

referred

489

to the septic focus in the apex of the left lung, but he

stated that it was riot sufficient to have caused the death

of Laxmibai. Illustrative cases of sudden diabetic coma as

a result of tubercular infection were not shown, and the

condition of Laxmibai, as deposed to by witnesses right up

to 9 p.m. on the night of November 12, 1956, does not

warrant- the inference that she had diabetic coma suddenly

as a result of this infection.

(3) Dr. Mehta also stated from the case papers maintained

by the appellant from February 15, 1956, to November 12,

1956, that during that time, Laxmibai did not appear to have

suffered from any severe type of acidosis. The appellant in

his examination in Court stated that Laxmibai was prone to

suffer from acidosis, and that he had treated her by the

administration of Soda Bi-carb. In the case papers, Soda

Bicarb has been administered only in about 8 to 10 doses

varying between 15 grains to a dram. It is significant that

on most of the occasions it was part of a Carminative

mixture. The acidosis, if any, could not have been so

severe as to have been corrected by such a small

administration of Soda Bi-carb, because the acidosis of

diabetes is not the acidity of the stomach but the formation

of fatty acids in the system. Such a condition, as the

books show, may be treated by the administration of Soda Bi-

carb but in addition to some other specific treatment.

(Joslin, Root & White, Treatment of Diabetes Mellitus, p.

397).

(4) A patient in diabetic coma is severely dehydrated.

(Root & White-Diabetes Mellitus p. 118). We have already

pointed out that there was no dehydration, because the skin

was soft and elastic and the tongue was pink. The eye balls

were also normal and were not soft, as is invariably the

case in diabetic coma. Dr. Mehta has referred to all these

points.

(5) Nausea and vomiting are always present in true diabetic

coma. There is nothing to show either from her clothes or

from the smell of vomit in the mouth or from any other

evidence that Laxmibai had vomitted in the train. Dr. Jhala

who performed the

490

postmortem examination had stated that Laxmibai could not

have vomitted because in her stomach 4 oz. of pasty meal was

found. The same fact is also emphasised by Dr. Mehta.

(6) In diabetic coma, there will befall of blood pressure,

rapid pulse; there will be Kussmaul breathing or

air hunger. The respiration of Laxmibai was found by Dr.

Ugale and Dr. Miss Aneeja to be normal. The temperature

chart in the case, Ex. 129, gives in parallel columns the

respiration corresponding to a particular temperature, and

the temperature of 99.5 degrees (Fahrenheit) found by Dr.

Miss Aneeja corresponds to respiration at 20 times per

minute. Dr. Variava, Dr. Ugale or Dr. Miss Aneeja also did

not say anything about the Kussmaul breathing, and the pulse

of 100 per minute according to Dr. Mehta was justified by

the temperature which Laxmibai then had. Indeed, according

to Dr. Mehta, in diabetic coma the skin is cold, and there

was no reason why there should be temperature. According to

Dr. Mehta, there was no evidence of any gastric disturbance,

because the condition of the tongue was healthy. Dr. Mehta

also pointed out that the Extensor reflex called the,

Babinsky sign was not present in diabetic coma, while

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according to Dr. Miss Aneeja it was present in this case.

Dr. Mehta then referred to the examination of the urine for

sugar and acetone, and stated that the examination for sugar

was insufficient to determine the presence of Ketonuria,

which is another name for the acidosis which results in

coma. We have already found that the examination for

acetone was not made and there was no mention of acetone

breath either by Dr. Ugale or by Dr. Miss Aneeja, which

would have been present if the acidosis was so advanced.

(Root & WhiteDiabetes Mellitus, p. 118).

(8) Lastly, the examination of cerebro-spinal fluid did not

show any increase of sugar and no affection in the

categories of meningial irritation was disclosed by the

chemical analysis of the fluid. (Physician's Hand. book, 4th

Edn., pp. 115-120). The neck rigidity which was noticed by

Dr. Miss Aneeja did not have, therefore,

491

any connection with such irritation, and it is a question

whether such a slight neck rigidity existed at all.

These reasons of Dr. Mehta are prefectly valid. They have

the support of a large number of medical treatises to which

he has referred and of even more. which were referred to us

during the arguments, all which we find it unnecessary to

quote. We accept Dr. Mehta's testimony that diabetic coma

did not cause the death of Laxmibai. It is significant that

the case of the appellant also has changed, and he has

ceased to insist now that Laxmibai died of diabetic coma.

The treatment which was given to Laxmibai would have, if

diabetic coma had existed, at least improved her condition

during the 5 hours that she was at the hospital. Far from

showing the slightest improvement, Laxmibai died within 5

hours -of her admission in the hospital, and in view of the

contra indications catalogued by Dr. Mehta and accepted by

us on an examination of the medical authorities, we are

firmly of opinion that death was not due diabetic coma.

We now deal with events that took place immediately after

Laxmibai expired. We have already shown that at that time

Dr. Variava was present and was questioning Dr. Miss Aneeja

about her diagnosis of diabetic coma. Before Dr. Variava

left the Ward, he told Dr. Miss Aneeja that he was not

satisfied about the diagnosis, and that a postmortem examin-

ation should be asked for. This endorsement was, in fact,

made by Dr. Miss Aneeja on the case papers, and the final

diagnosis was left blank. Dr. Miss Aneejia says that she

left the Ward at about 11-30 a.m. and was absent on her

rounds for an hour, then she returned to the Ward from her

quarters at about 1 p.m. and went to the office of Dr.'

Mouskar, the Resident Medical Officer. According to her,

she met Dr. Saify, the Registrar, at the door, and he had

the case papers in his hands. Dr. Saify told her that the

Resident Medical Officer thought that there was no need for

a postmortem examination, as the patient was treated in the

hospital for diabetic coma. Dr. Saify ordered Dr. Miss

Aneeja to cancel the endorserment about

492

postmortem and to write diabetic coma as the cause of death,

which she did, in Dr. Saify's presence. This is Dr. Miss

Aneeja's explanation why the postmortem was not made, though

ordered by Dr. Variava.

Dr. Mouskar's version is quite different. According to him,

the case papers arrived in his office at 1 p.m. He had seen

the endorsement about the postmortem and the fact that the

final diagnosis had not been entered in the appropriate

column. Dr. Mouskar admitted that he did not proceed to

make arrangements for the postmortem examination. According

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to him, the permission of the relatives and the Coroner was

necessary. He also admitted that he did not enquire from

the Honorary Physician about the need for postmortem

examination. He was thinking, he said, of consulting the

relatives and the person who had brought Laxmibai to the

hospital. Dr. Mouskar sent a telegram at 2 p.m. to the

appellant, which we have quoted earlier. He explained that

he did not mention the postmortem examination, because he

was waiting for the arrival of some person connected with

Laxmibai. He further stated that between 4 and 5 p.m. he

asked the police to remove the body to the J. J. Hospital

morgue and to preserve it, and sent a copy of his

requisition to the Coroner. According to him, on the 15th

the Coroner's office asked the hospital for the final

diagnosis in the case. He stated that he asked one out of

the three: Honorary Physician, the Registrar or the House

Pbysician,-about the final diagnosis, though he could not

say which one. He had sent the papers through the call-boy

for writing the final diagnosis, and he received the case

papers from the Unit, with the two corrections, namely, the

cancellation of the requisition for postmortem examination

and the entry of diabetic coma as the final diagnosis. He

denied that he had any talk with Dr. Saify regarding the

postmortem examination.

It,would appear from this that there are vital differences

in the versions of Dr. Miss Aneeja and Dr. Mouskar.. The

first contradiction is the date on which the case papers

were corrected and the second, about Dr. SaifY's

intervention in the matter. Dr. SaifY,

493

fortunately for him, had obtained leave orders and had left

Bombay on November 8, 1956, for Indore, where his father was

seriously ill. He was, in fact, detained at Indore, because

his father suffered from an attack of coronary thrombosis,

and he had to extend his leave. All the relevant papers

connected with his leave have been produced, and it seems

that Dr. Saify's name was introduced by Dr. Miss Aneeja

either to avoid taking responsibility for correction, on her

own, of the papers, or to shield some other person, who had

caused her to make the corrections. Here, the only other

person, who could possibly have ordered her was the Resident

Medical Officer, Dr. Mouskar, who at 1 p.m. had received the

papers and had seen the endorsement about the postmortem

examination. Dr. Mouskar's explanation that he sent the

telegram to the appellant for the removal of the body

without informing him about the postmortem examination is

too ingenious to be accepted by any reasonable person. Dr.

Mouskar could not ordinarily countermand what the Honorary

Physician had said without at least consulting him, which he

admits he did not do. This is more so, if it was only a

matter of the hospital's reputation. Whether the

corrections were made by Dr. Miss Aneeja in the wards when

the call-boy took the papers to her (a most unusal course

for Dr. Mouskar to have adopted) or whether they were made

by Dr. Miss Aneeja in the office of Dr. Mouskar, to the door

of which, she admits she had gone, the position remains the

same. Dr. Miss Aneeja no doubt told lies, but she did so in

her own interest. She could not cancel the requisition

about postmortem examination on her own without facing a

grave charge in which Dr. Mouskar would have played a

considerable part. The fact that this correction did not

trouble Dr. Mouskar and that his dealings with the body were

most unusual points clearly to its being made at his

instance. Dr. Miss Aneeja invented the story about Dr.

Saify as a last resort knowing that unless she named

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somebody the responsibility would be hers. The corrections

were made at the instance of Dr. Mouskar, because Dr.

Mouskar admits that he sent the papers to the

63

494

Ward for final diagnosis in the face of the endorsement

for postmortem examination, and Dr. Miss Aneeja admits

making the corrections at the door of Dr. Mouskar's office.

In our opinion, both of them are partly correct. Dr.

Mouskar made the first move in getting the papers corrected,

and Dr. Miss Aneeja corrected them not at the door of the

office, because there was no Dr. Saify there but in the

office, though she had not the courage to name Dr. Mouskar

as the person who had ordered the correction. Dr. Mouskar's

telegram and his sending the body to another morgue without

the postmortem examination show only too clearly that it was

he who caused the change to be made. It is also a question

whether the correction about 'acetone + + 'was not also made

simultaneously. We do not believe that the corrections were

made as late as November 15, because his telegram for the

removal of the dead body and its further removal to the J.

J. Hospital would not fit in with the endorsement for

postmortem examination on the case papers.

Now, the question is not whether Dr. Mouskar made the

correction or Dr. Miss Aneeja, but whether the appellant had

anything to do with it. Dr. Miss Aneeja stated that the

appellant was present till the visit of Dr. Variava was over

and this is borne out by the reply of the appellant, because

in the inland letter he mentioned the time of the death

which the telegram did not convey to him and which he could

have only known if he was present in the hospital. We

believe Dr. Miss Aneeja when she says that the appellant was

present at the hospital, and the circumstances of the case

unerringly point to the conclusion that he knew of the

demand for a postmortem examination. Though Dr. Mouskar and

the appellant denied that they met, there is reason to

believe that the appellant knowing of the postmortem

examination would not go away without seeing that the

postmortem examination was duly carried out or was given up.

Dr. Mouskar and the appellant both admitted that they were

together in the same class in 1934 in the S P. College,

Poona, though both of them denied that

495

they were acquainted with each other. Dr. Mouskar stayed in

Poona from 1922 to 1926, 1931 to 1936 and 1948 to 1951. The

appellant was practising at Poona as a doctor, and it is

improbable that they did not get acquainted during Dr.

Mouskar's stay, belonging, as they do, to the same

profession. Dr. Mouskar further tried to support the

appellant by saying that at 1 p.m. when he saw the case

papers the entry about acetone was read by him. He forgot

that in the examinationin-chief he had stated very

definitely that he had not read the case papers fully and

had only seen the top page. When he was asked for his

explanation, he could not account for his conduct in the

witness-box, and admitted his mistake. There are two other

circumstances connected with Dr. Mouskar, which excite

considerable suspicion. The first is that he mentioned

hysterical fits as the illness from which Laxmibai suffered

when Dr. Ugale had questioned it and postmortem had been

asked for to establish the cause of death. The next is that

the call book of the hospital for the period was not

produced by him as long as he was in office. When he

retired, the call book was brought in by his successor, and

it established the very important fact that it was not Dr.

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Saify, the Registrar, who was summoned but Dr. Shah, who had

also signed the call book in token of having received the

call. Dr. Mouskar's conduct as the Resident Medical Officer

in having the postmortem examination cancelled was a great

lapse, and it is quite obvious to us that the finding by the

two Courts below that this was done at the request of the

appellant is the only inference possible in the case. The

alternative suggestion in the argument of the appellant's

counsel that Dr. Mouskar thought that Dr. Variava was making

" a mountain out of a mole hill " and that " the reputation

of the hospital was involved " does not appeal to us,

because if that had been the motive, Dr. Mouskar would have

talked to Dr. Variava and asked him to revise his own

opinion. The cancellation of the requisition for postmortem

examination came to Dr. Variava as a surprise, because he

stated that he had heard nothing about it.

496

From the above analysis of the evidence, we accept the

following facts: The appellant was present in the hospital

till the death of Laxmibai, and in his presence, Dr. Variava

examined Laxmibai and questioned the diagnosis of Dr.

Miss Aneeja and gave the instructions for the postmortem

examination. Dr. Variava's stay was only for 15 minutes,

and at the end of it, Laxmibai expired. The statement of

the appellant that he caught the 10-30 train from Bombay to

Poona because he was asked by the Matron to leave the female

ward, and that he was going back to get a female attendant

from Poona, is entirely false. He took no action about a

female attendant either in Bombay or in Poona, and he could

not have left by the 10-30 train if he was present in the

hospital till 11-30 a.m. We are also satisfied that Dr. Miss

Aneeja did not cancel the endorsement about the postmortem

examination on her own responsibility. She was ordered to

do so. We are also satisfied that it was not Dr. Saify who

had given this order, but it must have been Dr. Mouskar, who

did so. We are also satisfied that Dr. Mouskar did not

induce Dr. Miss Aneeja to cancel the postmortem by sending

the case papers through the call-boy of her Ward, but she

was summoned to the office, to the door of which she admits

she had gone. We are, therefore, in agreement with the two

Courts below that Dr. Mouskar caused these changes to be

made, and that Dr. Miss Aneeja did not have the courage to

name the Resident Medical Officer, and lied by introducing

the name of Dr. Saify. We are also satisfied that Dr.

Mouskar and the appellant were acquainted with each other

not only when they were in College together but they must

have known each other, when Dr. Mouskar was residing at

Poona. The cancellation of the postmortem examination was

caused by the appellant, because Dr. Mouskar's explanation

on this part of the case is extremely unsatisfactory, and

his failure to consult Dr. Variava, if it was only a

hospital matter, is extremely significant. The appellant's

immediate exit from the hospital and the telegram to him at

Poona show that Dr. Mouskar knew where the appellant was to

be

497

found. The telegram conveyed to the appellant that the

postmortem was not to be held, because it said that the body

should be immediately removed.

Now, the appellant, as we have said, took no action about

Laxmibai's death and kept this information to himself. He

did not also arrange for the removal of the body. He sent

an inland letter which, he knew would take a day or two to

reach the hospital. He knew that the body would be lying

unclaimed at the hospital, and that the hospital could not

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hold the body for ever without taking some action. The

appellant is a doctor. He has studied in medical

institutions where bodies are brought for dissection

purposes, and he must be aware that there is an Anatomy Act,

under which unclaimed bodies are handed over to Colleges

after 48 hours for dissection. He also knew that the cause

of death would become more and more difficult to determine

as time passed on, and it is quite clear that the appellant

was banking on these two circumstances for the avoidance of

any detection into the cause of death. He had also seen to

it that the postmortem examination would not be made, and he

knew that if the body remained unclaimed, then it would be

disposed of in accordance with the Anatomy Act. He wrote a

letter which he knew would reach the hospital authorities,

and he named a fictitious brother who, he said, could not

arrive before the 16th from Calcutta. This delay would have

gained him three valuable days between the death and any

likely examination, and if the body remained unclaimed, then

it was likely to be disposed of in the manner laid down in

the Anatomy Act. The anticipations of the appellant were so

accurate that the body followed the identical course which

he had planned for it, and it is an accident that ten days

later a postmortem examination was made, because an

observant peon noticed some mark on the neck which he

thought, was suspicious. But for this, it would have been

impossible to trace what happened to Laxmibai, because the

hospital papers would have been filed, the body dissected by

medical students and disposed of and the relatives and

friends kept in the dark about the whereabouts of Laxmibai

by spurious letters.

498

This brings us to another piece of conduct which we have to

view. When Laxmibai boarded the train, she had a bedding

and a bag with her, which she was seen carrying at the Par

by Patil (P. W. 60) on the night she left Poona. There is

a mass of evidence that Laxmibai was in affluent

circumstances, and always wore on her person gold and pearl

ornaments. There is also evidence that she had taken Rs. 50

from -Virkar the night she travelled, and presumbly she was

carrying some more money with her, because she had to

consult a specialist in Bombay and money would be required

to pay him. When she reached the hospital in the company of

the appellant, she had no ornaments on her person, no money

in her possession and her bag and bedding had also

disappeared. As a matter of fact, there was nothing to

identify her or to distinguish her from any other indigent

woman in the street. There is no explanation which any

reasonable person can accept as to what happened to her

belongings. It is possible that the bag and the bedding

might have been forgotten in the hurry to take her to the

hospital, but her gold ornaments on her person could not so

disappear. The appellant stated that he noticed for the

first time in the taxi that she had no ornaments on her

person; but there would be no need for him to notice this

fact if Laxmibai started without any ornaments whatever. In

view of the fact that Laxmibai's entire property soon passed

into the hands of the appellant, it is reasonable to hold

that he would not overlook the valuable gold and pearl

ornaments in this context. Further, the absence of the

ornaments and other things to identify Laxmibai rendered her

anonymity complete, in so far as the hospital was concerned,

unless information to that end was furnished by the

appellant only. In the event of Laxmibai's death in the

hospital, no complication would arise if she did not possess

any property and the body would be treated as unclaimed, if

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none appeared to claim it.

In addition to the stripping of the lady of her belongings,

the appellant took measures to keep her

499

identity a close secret. No doubt, he gave her name as "

Indumati ", but he added to it her maiden surname in a

garbled form. According to Dr. Ugale, the name given was "

Paunshe ". - In every one of the other papers, the name

appears to have been corrected by the addition of some

letter resembling Ilk " but not in the case papers. Dr.

Ugale swore that he had not heard the name " Paunshe "

before, though his mother-tongue is Marathi, and he is

himself a Maharashtrian. He, therefore, asked the appellant

to spell the name, and he was definite that -the name was

written as spelt by the appellant. There is, however, other

evidence coming from the appellant himself to show that he

did not give the correct maiden surname of -Laxmibai,

because in the letter he wrote to the hospital he only

stated that there was an extra " u " in the name as entered

in the papers but did not mention anything about " k ". His

solicitude about the name and its spelling in the case

papers clearly shows that his mind even under the stress of

these circumstances was upon one fact only that the name

should remain either " Paunshe " or " Panshe " and not

become " Ponkshe ". Indeed, one would expect the appellant

to have given the name " Laxmibai Karve " or " Indumati

Karve " instead of " Indumati Ponkshe ", and much less, "

Indumati Paunshe ". There must be some reason for the

appellant choosing the maiden surname, even if he gave the

correct maiden name. The reason appears to be this: Either

he had to say at the hospital that he did not know the name,

or he had to give some name. If he said that he did not

know the name, it would have caused some suspicion, and the

matter would then have been entered in the emergency police

case register. This is deposed to by the doctors in the

hospital. By giving the name, he avoided this contingency.

By giving a garbled name, he avoided the identity, if by

chance that name came to the notice of some one who knew

Laxmibai. His intention can only be interpreted in the

light of his subsequent conduct and the use to which be put

this altered name. We have already seen that he did the

fact of death from every

500

one and wrote to people that the woman was alive. He had two

opportunities of correcting this name which he had noticed

very carefully on the case papers. The first was when he

wrote the letter to the hospital in which he insisted that "

u " should be omitted but did not add " k ". The other was

when on the 16th the police questioned him and he stated

that he did not know who the woman was. He also gave the

age of the woman wrongly, and perhaps, deliberately :-see

the correction and overwritings in the inland letter he

wrote on November 14, 1956. Immediately after the death of

Laxmibai, he misappropriated a sum of Rs. 5,000 by

presenting two documents, Exs. 285 and 286, without

disclosing to the Bank that the person who had issued the

cheque was no more. All this subsequent conduct gets tied

to his conduct in giving the name as " Indumati Paunshe " or

" Panshe "; and it shows a foreknowledge of what was to

happen to Indumati at the hospital. It also shows a

preparation for keeping the fact of her death hidden from

others to facilitate the misappropriation of her property,

which as we know, eventually took place starting from

November 15, that is to say, two days following her death.

No explanation worth considering exists why this name was

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given, and the effort of the counsel for the appellant that

he was probably on intimate terms with Laxmibai and chose to

call her by her maiden name rather than her married name is

belied by the fact that in every document in which the name

has been mentioned by the appellant, he has adderssed her as

Laxmibai Karve and not as Indumati Ponkshe. There is no

evidence that this elderly lady was anything more than a

foolishly trusting friend of this man who took advantage of

her in every way.

Then, there is the conduct of the appellant in not

disclosing to the hospital authorities the entire case

history of Laxmibai and the treatment which he had been

giving her as her medical attendant. Instead of telling the

doctor all the circumstances of her health, he told him that

the woman was suffering from hysterical fits, which fits,

according to the

501

evidence in the case, did not recur after 1948. He also did

not give any particulars of the onset of unconsciousness in

the train. Even the fact that Laxmibai had suffered from

diabetes for some years was not mentioned, and this shows

that he was intent upon the medical attendants in the

hospital treating the case from a scratch and fumbling it,

if possible. To him, it appears to us, it was a matter of

utter indifference what treatment was given to her, an

attitude which he continued to observe even after his

patient had died. In our opinion, therefore, the conduct at

the hospital appears significantly enough to suggest that he

anticipated that Laxmibai was doomed, and he was intent upon

seeing to it that no one but himself should know of her

death and that a quiet disposal of her body should take

place.

We may mention here one other fact, and that is that the

G.T. Hospital, is situatted at a distance of 5 or 6 furlongs

from the Victoria Terminus Station, whereas the St. George's

Hospital is said to be only 50 feet away from the main

entrance. Why an unconscious woman was carried first on a

stretcher and then in a taxi to this distant hospital when

she could have been carried straight to the hospital on the

stretcher itself, is not explained. There is of course,

this significant fact that at the St. George's Hospital he

would not have been able to pull his weight with the medical

authorities, which he was able to do with Dr. Mouskar

because of his acquaintance with him. This choosing of the

hospital is of a piece with the choosing of an inconvenient

train which would make detection difficult, arrival at the

hospital when it would be closed except for emergency cases,

and the patient likely to be waited upon by a raw and

inexperienced doctor in the early hours of the morning. We,

however, cannot say this too strongly, because it is likely

that Laxmibai herself chose to travel by a night train. But

the whole of the conduct of the appellant prior to the death

of Laxmibai appears to be of a piece with his conduct after

her death, and we are satisfied that even before her entry

into the hospital, the appellant had planned this line of

conduct.

64

502

Our findings thus substantially accord on all the relevant

facts with those of the two Courts below, though the

arrangement and consideration of the relevant evidence on

record is somewhat different. It is now necessary to

consider the arguments which have been advanced on behalf of

the appellant. The first contention is that the essential

ingredients required to be proved in all cases of murder by

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poisoning were not proved by the prosecution in this case.

Reference in this connection. is made to a decision of the

Allahabad High Court in Mst. Gujrani v. Emperor (1) and two

unreported decisions of this Court in Chandrakant Nyalchand

Seth v. The, State of Bombay(2) decided on February 19,

1958, and Dharambir Singh v. The State of Punjab (3) decided

on November 4, 1958. In these cases, the Court referred to

three propositions which the prosecution must establish in a

case of poisoning: (a) that death took place by poisoning;

(b) that the accused had the poison in his possession ; and

(c) that the accused had an opportunity to administer the

poison to the deceased. The case in Dharambir Singh V. The

State of Punjab (3) turned upon these three propositions.

There, the deceased had died as a result of poisoning by

potassium cyanide, which poison was also found in the

autopsy. The High Court had disbelieved the evidence which

sought to establish that the accused had obtained potassium

cyanide, but held, nevertheless, that the circumstantial

evidence was sufficient to convict the accused in that case.

This Court did not, however, accept the circumstantial

evidence as complete. It is to be observed that the three

propositions were laid down not as the invariable criteria

of proof by direct evidence in a case of murder by

poisoning, because evidently if after poisonidgthevictim,

the accused destroyed all traces of the body, the first

proposition would be incapable of being proved except by

circumstantial evidence. Similarly, if the accused gave a

victim something: to eat and the victim died immediately on

the ingestion of that food with symptoms of poisoning and

(1) A.I.R. 1933 All. 394. (2) Cr. A. No. 120 Of 1957.

(3) Cr. k. No. 98 of 1958.

503

poison, in fact, was found in the viscera, the requirement

of proving that the accused was possessed of the poison

would follow from the circumstance that accused gave the

victim something to eat and need not be separately proved.

There have been cases in which conviction was maintained,

even though the body of the victim had completely

disappeared, and it was impossible to say, except on

circumstantial evidence, whether that person was the victim

of foul play, including poisoning. Recently, this Court in

Mohan v. State of U. P. (1) decided on November 5, 1959,

held that the proof of the fact of possession of the poison

was rendered unnecessary, because the victim died soon after

eating pedas given by the accused in that case, and he had

not partaken any other food likely to contain poison. In

Dr. Palmer's case (2) , strychnine was not detected, and the

accused was convicted by the jury after Lord Chief Justice

Campbell (Cresswell, J. and Mr. Baron Alderson-, concurring)

charged the jury that the discovery of the poison on

autopsy, was not obligatory, if they were satisfied on the

evidence of symptoms that death had been caused by the

ministration of the strychnine. The conduct of Palmer,

which was also significant, was stressed inasmuch as he had

attempted to thwart a successful chemical analysis of the

viscera, and had done suspicious acts to achieve that end.

In Dr. Crippen's case (3), the conduct of the accusedafter

the death of Mrs. Crippen in making the friends and

relatives believe that Mrs. Crippen was alive was considered

an incriminatory circumstance pointing to his guilt. No

doubt, in Dr. Crippen's case (3), the body was found and

poison was detected, but there was no proof that Dr. Crippen

had administered the poison to her, that being inferred from

his subsequent conduct in running away with Miss Le Neve.

In the second case of this Court, the poison was availiable

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to the victim, and it was possible that she had taken it to

end an unhappy life.

The cases of this Court which were decided, proceeded upon

their own facts, and though the three

(1) Cr. A. No. 108 of 1959. (2) Notable Trials Series.

(3) Notable Trials Series.

504

propositions must be kept in mind always, the sufficiency of

the evidence, direct or circumstantial, to establish murder

by poisoning will depend on the facts of each case. If the

evidence in a particular case does of not justify the

inference that death is the result of poisoning because of

the failure of the prosecution to prove the fact

satisfactorily, either directly or by circumstantial

evidence, then the benefit of the doubt will have to be

given to the accused person. But if circumstantial

evidence, in the absence of direct proof of the three

elements, is so decisive that the Court can unhesitatingly

hold that death was a result of administration of poison

(though not detected) and that the poison must have been

administered by the accused person, then the conviction can

be rested on it.

In a recent case decided in England in the Court of Criminal

Appeal (Regina v. Onufrejczyk- (1), the body of the victim

was not found at all. And, indeed, there was no evidence

that he had died, much less was murdered. The accused's

conduct in that case which was held decisive, was very

similar to the conduct of the present appellant. He was in

monetary difficulties, and the victim was his partner, whom

he wished to buy out but did not have the money to do so.

One fine day, the partner disappeared, and his body was not

found, and it was not known what had happened to him. The

activities of the accused after the disappearance of his

partner were very -remarkable. To people who enquired from

him about his partner, he told all manner of lies as -to how

a large and dark car had arrived in the night and that three

men bad carried off his partner at the point of a revolver.

To a sheriff 's officer he stated that his partner had gone

to see a doctor. He also asked a lady to send him some sham

registered letters and forged other documents. Lord Chief

Justice Goddard stated the law to be that in a trial for

murder, the fact of death could be proved by circumstantial

evidence alone, provided the jury were warned that the

evidence must lead to one conclusion only, and that even

though there was no body or even trace of a body or any

direct evidence as to

(1) [1955] 1.Q.B 388.

505

the manner of the death of a victim, the corpus delicti

could be held to be proved by a number of facts, which

rendered the commission of the crime certain. pertinent to

remember that Lord Goddard observer during the course of

argument that there was no virtue in the words " direct

evidence ", and added:

"It would be going a long way, especially these days when we

know what can be done with acid, to say that there cannot be

a conviction without some proof of a body. If you are right

you have to admit that a successful disposal of the body

could prevent a conviction."

It is obvious that Lord Goddard had in mind the case of John

George Haigh (1) who, as is notorious, disposed of bodies by

steeping them in acid bath, destroying all traces. It is,

in this context, instructive to read a case from Now Zealand

to which Lord Goddard also referred, where the body of the

victim was never found, The King v. Horry (2 ). The

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statement of the law as to proof of corpus delicti laid down

by Gresson,J. (concurred in by Fair, A.C.J., Stanton, J. and

Hay, J.) was approved by Lord Goddard with one slight

change. The statement of the law (head-note) is as follows

:

" At the trial of a person charged with murder, the fact of

death is provable by circumstantial evidence,

notwithstanding that neither the body nor any trace of the

body has been found, and that the accused has made no

confession of any participation in the crime. Before he can

be convicted, the fact of death should be proved by such

circumstances as render the commission of the crime morally

certain and leave no ground for reasonable doubt: the

circumstantial evidence should be so cogent and compelling

as to convince a jury that upon no rational hypothesis other

than murder can the facts be accounted for."

Lord Goddard did not agree with the words " morally certain

" and stated that he would have preferred to say " such

circumstances as render the commission

of the crime certain."

(1) Notable Trials Series.

(2) [1952) N.Z.L.R. 111.

506

The same test has been applied by Wills in his Book on

Circumstantial Evidence, and the author has quoted the case

of Donellan (1), where the conduct of Donellan in rinsing

out a bottle in spite of the wife of the victim asking him

not to touch those bottles, was treated as a very

significant evidence of guilt. Butler, J., charged the jury

that:

" if there was a doubt upon the evidence of the physical

witnesses they must take into their consideration all the

other circumstances either to show that there was poison

administered or that there was not, and that every part of

the prisoner's conduct was material to be considered."

Similarly, in Donnall's case (2 ), Abbot, J., according to

Wills, in summing up, said to the jury that: "there were two

important questions: first did the deceased die of poison?

and if they should be of opinion that she did, then whether

they were satisfied from the evidence that the poison was

administered by the prisoner or by his means. There were

some parts of the evidence which appeared to him equally

applicable to both questions, and those parts were what

related to the conduct of the prisoner during the time of

the opening and inspection of the body; his recommendation

of a shell and the early burial; to which might be added the

circumstances, not much to be relied upon, relative to his

endeavours to evade his apprehension. His Lordship also

said, as to the question whether the deceased died by

poison, I in considering what the medical men have said upon

the one side and the other, you must take into account the

conduct of the prisoner in urging a hasty funeral and his

conduct in throwing away the contents of the jug into the

chamber utensil'."

In Rex v. Horry (3), where the entire case law in England

was presented for the consideration of the Court, it was

pointed out by the Court that there was no rule in England

that corpus delicti must be proved by direct evidence

establishing the death of the person

(1) Gurneys Rep. (1781) (2) (1817) 2 C. & K 308n.

(3) [1952] N.Z.L.R. 111.

507

and further, the cause of that death. Reference was made to

Evans v. Evans(1), where it was ruled that that corpus

delicti might be proved by direct evidence or by "

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irresistible grounds of presumption ". In the same case, it

has been pointed out that in New Zealand the Court upheld

numerous convictions, where the body of the victim was never

found.

The rule of law stated by Sir Matthew Hale in Pleas of the

Crown Vol. 2, p. 290 that " I would never convict any person

of murder or manslaughter, unless the fact were proved to be

done, or at least the body found dead " was not accepted in

this and other bases. Lord Goddard also rejected the

statement as one of universal application, in the case to

which we have already referred.

The case of Mary Ann Nash(2) is illustrative of the

proposition that even though the cause of death may not

appear to be established by direct evidence, the

circumstances of the case may be sufficient to infer that a

murder has been committed. In that case, the prisoner had

an illegitmate son, 5 years old. There was evidence to show

that the mother desired to put the child out of her way.

One day in June, 1907, the mother left the house and

returned without the child. She made several statements as

to what had happened to the child, which were found to be

untrue. As late as April 1908, the body of a child was

discovered in a well. Decomposition had so far advanced

that even the sex of the child could not be determined.

There was nothing therefore to show whether death was

natural or violent, or whether it had occurred before or

after the body was put into the well. The case was left to

the jury. On appeal, it was contended that there being no

proof how death took place, the judge should not have left

the case to the Jury but ought to have withdrawn it. Lord

Chief Justice delivering the judgment of the Court of Appeal

referred to the untrue statements of the prisoner about the

wherebouts of the child, and observed as follows:

" All these statements were untrue. She bad an object in

getting rid of the child, and if it had been

(1) 161 E.R. 466, 491.

(2) (1911) 6 Cr. App. R. 225.

508

lost or met with an accidental death, she had every interest

in saying so at once. It is said there is no evidence of

violent death, but we cannot accept that Mr. Goddard cannot

have meant that there must be proof from the body itself of

a violent death. . . . In view of the facts that the child

left home well and was afterwards found dead, that the

appellant was last seen with it, and made untrue statements

about it, this is not a case which could have been withdrawn

from the jury."

There is no difference between a trial with the help of the

jury and a trial by a Judge in so far as the appraisement of

evidence is concerned. The value of the evidence in each

case must necessarily be the same. If the case of Mary Ann

Nash (1) could be left to the jury, here too the case has

been decided by the two Courts below concurrently against

the appellant on evidence on which theY could legitimately

reach the conclusion whether an offence of murder had been

established or not.

A case of murder by administration of poison is almost

always one of secrecy. The poisoner seldom takes another

into his confidence, and his preparations to the commission

of the offence are also secret. He watches his opportunity

and administers the poison in a manner calculated to avoid

its detection. The greater his knowledge of poisons, the

greater the secrecy, and consequently the greater the

difficulty of proving the case agaisnt him. What assistance

a man of science can give he gives; but it is too much to

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say that the guilt of the accused must, in all cases, be

demonstrated by the isolation of the poison, though in a

case where there is nothing else such a course would be

incumbent upon the prosecution. There are various factors

which militate against a successsful isolation of the poison

and its recognition. The discovery of the poison can only

take place either through a postmortem examination of the

internal organs or by chemical analysis. Often enough, the

diagnosis of a poison is aided by the information which may

be furnished by relatives and friends as to the symptoms

1 161 E R. 466 491

509

found on the victim, if the course of poison has taken long

and others have had an opportunity of watching its effect.

Where, however, the poision is administered in secrecy and

the victim is rendered unconscious effectively, there is

nothing to show how the deterioration in the condition of

the victim took place and if not poison but disease is

suspected, the diagnosis of poisoning may be rendered

difficult. In Chapman's case(1), the victim (Maud Marsh)

was sent to Guy's Hospital, where the doctors diagnosed her

condition to be due to various- maladies including cancer

umatism and acute dyspepsiaIt is clear that doctors can be

deceived by thesymptoms of poison into believing tHat

they have a genuine case of sickness on hand. In Dr.

Palmer's case (2), two medical witnesses for the defence

diagnosed the case from the symptoms as being due to Angina

Pectoris or epilepsy with tetanic complications.

The reason for all this is obvious. Lambert in his book

"The Medico-Legal Post-Mortem in India (pp. 96,99.100) has

stated that the pathologist's part in the diagnosis of

poisoning is secondary, and has further observed that

several poisons particularly of the synthetic hypnotics and

vegetable alkaloids groups do not leave any characteristic

signs which can be noticed on postmortem examination. See

Modi's Medical Jurisprudence and Toxicology, 13th Edn., pp.

450-451 and Taylor's Principles and Practice of Medical

Jurisprudence, Vol. ll,p. 229. The same is stated by Otto

Saphir in his book " Autopsy " at pp. 71 and 72. In

Dreisbach's Handbook of Poisons. 1955, it is stated that

pathological findings in deaths from narcotic analgesics are

not characteristic. He goes further and says that even the

laboratory findings are non-contributory. The position of

the pathologist who conducts a postmortem examination has

been summed up by Modi in Medical Jurisprudence and

Toxicology, 13th edn., p. 447 as follows:

" In order to make a probable guess of the poison and to

look for its characteristic postmortem appearances, it is

advisable that a medical officer, before

(1) Notable Trials Series.

(2) Notable Trials Series.

65

510

commencing a postmortem examination on the body of a

suspected case of poisoning, should read the

police report and endeavour to get as much information as

possible from the relatives of the deceased

regarding the quality and quantity of the poison

administered, the character of the symptoms with reference

to their onset and the time that elapsed between the taking

of the poison and the development of the first symptoms, the

duration of the illness, nature of the treatment adopted,

and the time of death. He will find that in most cases the

account supplied by the police and the relatives is very

meagre, or incorrect and misleading. His task is,

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therefore, very difficult, especialy when many of the

poisons except corrosives and irritants do not show any

characteristic postmortem signs and when bodies are in an

advanced state of decomposition . . . ".

Similarly, Gonzales in Legal Medicine and Toxicology states

at p. 629:

" The question of whether or not a negative toxicologic

examination is consistent with death by poison can be

answered affirmatively, as may persons overcome by carbon

monoxide die after twenty-four hours, at which time the gas

cannot be determined in the blood by chemical tests.

Likewise, the organs of individuals who have been poisoned

by phosphorus may not contain the toxic substance respons-

ible for death if they have managed to survive its effects

for several days.

Many conditions seriously interfere with the toxicologic

examination, such as postmortem decomposition . . . . ".

We need not multiply authorities, because every book on

toxicology begins with a statement of such a fact. Of

course, there is a chemical test for almost every poison,

but it is impossible to expect a search for every poison.

Even in chemical analysis, the chemical analyser may be

unsuccessful for various reasons. Taylor in his Principles

and Practice of Medical Jurisprudence, Vol. 11, p. 228 gives

-three possible explanations for negative findings, viz.,

(1) the case

511

may have been of disease only; (2) the poison may have been

eliminated by vomitting or other means or neutralised or

metabolised; and (3) the analysis may have been faultily

performed. Svensson Wendel in Crime Detection has stated at

p. 281 that:

" Hypnotics are decomposed and disappear very quickly-some

even in the time which elapses between the administration

and the occurrence of death.

Circumstantial evidence in this context means a combination

of facts creating a net-work through which there is no

escape for the accused, because the facts taken as a whole

do not admit of any inference but of his guilt. To rely

upon the findings of the medical man who conducted the

postmortem and of the chemical analyser as decisive of the

matter is to render the other evidence entirely fruitless.

While the circumstances often speak with unerring certainty,

the autopsy and the chemical analysis taken by themselves

may be most misleading. No doubt, due weight must be given

to the negative findings at such examinations. But, bearing

in mind the difficult task which the man. of medicine

performs and the limitations under which he works, his

failure should not be taken as the end of the case, for on

good and probative circumstances, an irresistible inference

of guilt can be drawn.

In the present case, the effort of the appellant has been to

persuade the Court that the death of Laxmibai was possibly

the result of disease rather than by poison. During the

course of the case and the appeal, various theories have

been advanced and conflicting diagnoses have been mooted.

The case of the appellant has wavered between death by

diabetic coma and by hypoglycemia, though relying upon the

condition of the arteries and the aorta and the rigidity of

the neck-, suggestions of coronary complications and renal

failure have also been made. We have shown above that this

was not a case of diabetic coma, because of the absence of

the cardinal symptoms of diabetic coma. This also is the

opinion of Dr. Variava and Dr. Mehta, though Dr. Jliala, for

reasons which we have indicated, accepted it. The appellant

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argued again the case

512

from the angle of diabetic coma, but later veered in favour

of hypoglycemia. This change noticeable not only in the

arguments before us but also throughout the conduct of the

case is merely to confuse the issue, and create, if

possible, a doubt, which would take the mind away from the

surrounding circumstances, and focus it only upon the

medical aspect of the case. Full advantage has been taken of

the findings of Dr. Ugale and Dr. Miss Aneeja, which suggest

partly an onset of diabetic coma, partly of hypoglycemia,

and partly of renal failure. There is no true picture of

any one disease. The rigidity of the neck was not reflected

in the chemical analysis of the cerebro-spinal fluid and was

negatived, in so far as renal failure is concerned, by the

negative findings about albumin. Diabetic coma stood ruled

out by the presence of the Babinsky sign and the suddenness

of the onset, the negative aspect of acetone breath and the

rather remarkable failure of the specific treatment given

for it to have worked any change. Driven from these

considerations to -such doubtful suggestions as coronary

complications of which no physical evidence was found by Dr.

Jhala, the appellant put his case 'on hypoglycemia, and

relied upon the fact that at the hospital 40 units of

insulin intravenously and another 40 units subcutaneously

were administered. Medical text-books were quoted to show

that in the case of hypoglycemic coma the introduction of

even a small quantity of insulin sometimes proves fatal.

The learned AdvocateGeneral stoutly resisted this move,

which was at variance with the case as set out before the

High Court, because it is obvious enough that if one

accepted the theory of hypoglycemic coma, the only

injections of insulin causing such shook would be proved to

have been given at the hospital and not by the appellant.

Here, the position, however, is not so difficult for the

State, because Laxmibai was found to have 4 oz. of pasty

meal in her stomach, and with food inside her, the

possibility of hypoglycemia taking place naturally was

extremely remote. If it was hypoglycemic coma due to

excessive administration of insulin, then it must have been

administered prior to its onset, and who could have

513

given it but the appellant ? Even though coma supervenes

suddenly, the patient passes through symptoms of discomfort,

and Laxmibai would have told the appellant about it in the

train. The appellant mentioned nothing of this to Dr.

Ugale. If an excessive dose of insulin was given by the

appellant, the question of intent would arise, and the

conduct shows the intention. There were no pronounced

symptoms of hypoglycemia either. Laxmibai just passed from

unconsciousness to death without the manifestation of any of

the signs associated with the syndrome of hypoglycemic

death. It is also to be remembered that hypoglycemic coma

is generally overcome by the administration of a very small

quantity of glucose (5 or10 grams of glucose orally):

Treatment of Diabetes Mellitus by Joslin, Root and White, p.

350. The 40 units given intravenously were mixed with 20 C.

C. of glucose and carried the palliative with them. Even

otherwise, Laxmibai was receiving glucose by intragastric

drip, and during the three and a half hours, there should

have been an improvement. The surprising part is that the

administration of the insulin and glucose brought about no

visible symptoms in the patient either for better or for

worse. She passed into death, and the inference can only be

that she did not die of these diseases of which she was

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either suspected or for which she was treated but of

something else, which could not answer to the treatment

given to her. Dreisbach in his Handbook on Poisons at p. 27

has stated that coma also results from the action of several

poisons.

Depressants, sedatives and hypnoties all cause death by

coma (ibid. p. 201). The symptoms, according to the author,

are sleepiness, mental confusion, unsteadiness rapidly

followed by coma with slow shallow respiration, flaccid

muscles and absent deep reflexes. The difference between

coma due to disease and coma as the result of poisons is

stated by him in the following words:

Coma from poisoning presumably results from some

interference with brain cell metabolism. In attempting to

combat the effects of drugs which induce coma, remember that

no agents are known

514

which will specifically overcome the metabolic derangements

of drug-induced coma. The mechanism of action of cerebral

stimulant drugs is also unknown, but these drugs presumably

act by depressing some inhibiting function in the cell.

There is no evidence that any stimulants specifically oppose

the cellular metabolic depression induced by the depressant

drugs such as the barbiturates."

No specific antidote is known for the sedative and hypnotic

drugs. (Ibid. p. 202).

The condition of Laxmibai clearly indicated an impairment of

the central nervous system. It is no doubt true that in

some cases of coronary thrombosis, coma supervenes; but it

is idle to suggest in the present case that Laxmibai was

afflicted by this type of coma, because Dr. Jhala who

performed the postmortem examination and opened the coronary

arteries found no evidence of thrombosis. According to Otto

Saphir, a myocardial infarct is easily detected. (Autopsy,

pp. 301-302). Coma in Laxmibai's case, as we have shown

above, was not the result either of acidosis, hypoglycemia,

renal failure or meningial irritation. Her liver, pancreas

and kidney were found to have no pathological lesions, and

it is significant that no question was even attempted to

establish that the opinion of Dr. Jhala on this part of the

case was incorrect. Learned counsel for the appellant

suggested that the examination by Dr. Jhala might have been

superficial, and might not have included a microscopical

examination of sections of some of the vital organs normally

affected by diabetes. This suggestion, in our opinion,

ought to have been put forward during the cross-examination

of the witness, and it is unfair now to suggest that the

opinion that no lesions were found was based on either

improper or inadequate examination. We hold that Dr. Jhala

performed the examination adequately, and he was also helped

by his assistants.

Here, we pause to ask a question why the appellant brought

up the question of hysterical fits at all. He could have

said that Laxmibai was a diabetic, and that it was likely

she had coma by reason of that

515

disease. The suggested diagnosis given by the appellant was

so unlikely that Dr. Ugale questioned it then and there.

There is nothing in the Wanlesswadi T.B. Sanatorium papers

or in Dr. Sathe's evidence to show that Laxmibai had

hysterical fits after her hysterectomy operation. No

suggestion was made to the doctors in Court that Laxmibai

might have had hysterical fits. The condition of the

muscles and the absence of deep reflexes clearly show that

this was just another piece of deception. It is not

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possible to hold that the appellant gave the full

particulars to Dr. Miss Aneeja. No suggestion was made to

her or to Dr. Ugale that any information other than what was

noted in the case papers was furnished. There is no case

for holding 'that Laxmibai had a relapse of hysterical fits.

It would, therefore, appear that Laxmibai's condition was

not due to any disease, because diseases inducing coma

generally leave some trace behind, and also respond to

medication. No doubt, in some cases the pathological

findings after death from diabetic coma have been negative,

but the question is if this was such a case. We have, on

the one hand, the fact that numerous poisons causing coma

leave no identifiable trace in the victim after death, and,

on the other, that sometimes the autopsy does not disclose

any discoverable signs in a patient who dies after an attack

of diabetic coma or disease. The appellant can be presumed

to have had knowledge of these poisons. The appellant

challenged the Advocate-General to show from any standard

book that the symptoms found by the doctors accorded with

any known poison. Here, it must also be remembered that a

man with knowledge may manipulate not one but more drugs to

achieve his purpose, and the cardinal signs of poisoning on

the victim may, as a result, be either obliterated or, at

least significantly modified. We give one example on ,which

a certain amount of knowledge is possessed even by laymen.

A poison of which one of the symptoms would be the

contracting of the pupils of the eyes may be side-tracked by

putting into the eyes of the victim a drug like atropine,

which by its local

516

action dilates the pupils. We give this example, because

most of us know the action of atropine on the eyes, and

because the example also shows how easily a person with

knowledge may confuse the symptoms by a simple trick. We

are not suggesting that this is what has happened in this

case; but when we have to deal with a case of crime versus

natural death, we cannot overlook the possibility of some

ingenious artifice having been used to screen the action.

If Laxmibai died in circumstances which prima facie admit of

either disease or homicide by poisoning, we must look at the

conduct of the appellant who brought her to the hospital,

and consider to what conclusion that conduct unerringly

points. If the appellant as an honest medical man had taken

Laxmibai to the hospital and she had died by reason of

disease, his conduct would have been entirely different. He

would not have taken her to the hospital bereft of property

with which she started from home; he would not have given a

wrong or misleading name to cover her identity; he would not

have given a wrong age and wrong history of her ailments; he

would not have written a letter suggesting that she had a

brother in Calcutta, which brother did not exist; he would

not have abandoned the corpse to be dealt with by the

hospital as an unclaimed body; he would not have attempted

to convince the world that she was alive and happily

married; he would not have obtained her property by

forgeries, impersonation and other tricks indulged in both

before and after her death; but he would have informed her

relatives and done everything in his power to see that she

was properly treated and stayed on to face whatever inquiry

the hospital wished to make into the cause of death and not

tried to avoid the postmortem examination and would not have

disappeared, never to reappear. His prevarications about

where' Laxmibai was, make a big and much varied list, and

his forgeries cover scores of documents. In the words of

Baron Parke in Towell's case (1):

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Circumstantial evidence is the only evidence which can in

cases of this kind lead to discovery.

(1)(1854) 2 C. & K. 309.

517

There is no way of investigating them except by the use of

circumstantial evidence; but it most frequently happens that

great crimes committed in secret leave behind them some

traces, or are accompanied by some circumstances which lead

to the discovery and punishment of the offender... Direct

evidence of persons who saw the fact, if that proof is

offered upon the testimony of men whose veracity you have no

reason to doubt is the best proof; but, on the other hand,

it is equally true with regard to circumstantial.evidence,

that the circumstances may often be so clearly proved, so

closely connected with it, or leading to one result in

conclusion, that the mind may be as well convinced as if it

were proved by eye-witnesses."

The appellant in this case took some risk in taking Laxmibai

to the hospital arid in giving his name there; and these

aspects were, in fact, stressed as arguments in the case.

As regards the first part, the argument overlooks that what

appears to us to be a risk might not have so appeared to the

appellant, who might have been sure of his own ability to

screen himself. To him, the death of Laxmibai at the

hospital without discovery of poison would be the greatest

argument in his favour that he had acted honestly. The

second argument is equally unacceptable to us. The

appellant could not take the risk of a false name and

address, if he was intending that the body should be

disposed of as unclaimed. By giving his own address he

could keep the strings in his own hands. If he gave an

address and no reply came from that address, the hospital

would suspect foul play. If he gave the address of

Laxmibai, people in Poona would know of this mysterious

death, and they would remember the death of Purshottam alias

Arvind in 1954. At that time also a postmortem examination

on the body of Arvind was held (see, evidence of Ramachandra

(P. W. 1)), and the explanation of the appellant given in

writing on January 22, 1954, is set out below in his own

words:

" My name is Anant Chihtaman Lagu, age... years, residing at

No. 431/5, Madiwale Colony, Poona, on

66

518

being questioned state that I am the family doctor

of Karve family in H. No. 94-95, Shukrawar. The deceased

Purshottam Anant Karve belongs to that family. He came from

Bombay to Poona on Saturday, the 16th January, 1954. He had

come to me on Sunday, the 17th February, 1954, for medicine

for weakness. I treated him for 2 clays, on 17th and 18th.

He had neither told me that there was poisoning in his

stomach, nor did I detect any even when I examined and

treated him. He became unconscious 5 hours before his

death. He was taken to the Sassoon Hospital at 9 p.m. on

18th January, 1954. He was taken to the Sassoon Hospital

because his disease was increased in unconsciousness and

also because his mother as also myself and Dr. Joshi were of

the same opinion. He died there in about 30 to 45 minutes.

The fact that there was deliberate poisoning by somebody,

was neither revealed in my examination nor did Purshottam

Karve speak to me anything about it during the time I

treated him 2 days before. What exactly was the cause of

death could not be revealed during my treatment. I do not

know if somebody is on bad terms with him. There are

rumours about suicide but there is no reason or any

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circumstance whatsoever for doing so. "

A false address would have started enquiries at the hospital

end. Laxmibai's own address would have started speculation

in Poona. It was for this reason that the appellant had to

choose another place and to trim between fact and fiction so

that he might be able to deal with the matter himself Of

course, Laxmibai did have an address of her own which could

have been given, and which did not cease to be her address

because she had got an attack of coma, from which people are

known to recover.

These arguments, however, are of no avail, in view of the

appellsnt's entire conduct now laid bare, which conduct has

been proved to our satisfaction to have begun not after the

death of Laxmibai but much ,earlier. This conduct is so

knit together as to make a net-work of circumstances

pointing only to his guilt,

519

The case is one of extreme cunning and premeditation.. The

appellant, whose duty it was to care for this unfortunate

lady as a friend and as her medical adviser, deliberately

set about first to ingratiate himself in her good opinion,

and becoming her confidant, found out all about her affairs.

All this time he was planning to get at her property after

taking her life. He did not perpetrate his scheme at Poona,

where the death might have brought a host of persons to the

hospital. He devised a diabolical scheme of unparalleled

cunning and committed an almost perfect murder. But murder,

though it hath no tongue, speaks out sometimes. His method

was his own undoing; because even the long arm of

coincidence cannot explain the multitude of circumstances

against him, and they destroy the presumption of innocence

with which law clothed him. In our judgment, the two Courts

below were perfectly correct in their conclusion that the

death of Laxmibai was the result of the administration of

some unrecognised poison or drug which would act as a

poison, and that the appellant was the person who

administered it. We, accordingly, confirm the conviction.

As regards the sentence of death passed on the appellant by

the Sessions Judge and confirmed by the High Court, it is

the only sentence that could be imposed for this planned and

cold-blooded murder for gain, and we do not interfere with

it.

The appeal fails, and it will be dismissed.

SARKARJ.-In my opinion this appeal should be allowed.

The appellant was tried by the Sessions Judge, Poona, on a

charge under s. 302 of the Indian Penal Code for the murder

of Laxmibai Karve on November 13, 1956, by administering

poison, to her and was convicted and sentenced to death.

His appeal to the High Court at Bombay against the

conviction and sentence failed. He has now appealed to this

Court with special leave.

The evidence against the appellant is all circumstantial.

The question to be decided in this appeal is

520

whether that evidence is such that the only reasonable

conclusion from it is that the appellant was guilty of the

charge brought against him.

Laxmibai Karve, the deceased, was the widow of one Anant

Karve who was a businessman of Poona. Laxmibai was married

in 1922 at the age of eleven to Anant Karve, then a widower.

Her maiden name was Indumati Ponkshe. After her marriage

she was given the name Laxmibai but was also called Indumati

or Indutai or Mai Karve or simply Mai. It does not appear

that after her marriage she had been known by her father's

surname of Ponkshe, a fact the significance of which will

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appear later.

Anant Karve had a son named Vishnu by his first wife. By

Laxmibai he bad two sons, Ramchandra and Purshottam also

called Arvind.

Anant Karve died in 1945 leaving a will. By his will he

gave Laxmibai a right of residence in tree rooms in his

dwelling house at No. 93-95, Shukrawar Peth, Poona and a

right to receive Rs. 50 per month from the rent of that

house which was in part let out, and made certain other

bequests to her. He devised the rest of his properties to

his sons. Besides what she had received from her husband,

Laxmibai in 1954 inherited the properties of Purshottam who

had died interstate and unmarried in that year. She further

inherited a large sum of money and gold ornaments of

considerable value from her mother, Girjabai, who had died

in 1946 or 1947. She bad also considerable valuable

ornaments of her own. Her total assets amounted in 1956 to

about Rs. 80,000. Part of her liquid assets were held in

shares and debentures in limited companies. She had also

certain moneys in an account in her name in the Bank of

Maharashtra. A considerable sum was due to her from one

Joshi to whom she had given a loan.

After the death of her husband, differences cropped up

between Laxmibai and her elder SOD, Ramchandra. In 1946

Ramchandra started living separately from his mother in the

same house and used to take his food in a hotel In October

1952, Ramchandra joined military

521

service as a craftsman and left Poona. Since joining

service till the death of Laxmibai he was not residing at

Poona but came there now and then. In May 1956, Laxmibai

got Ramchandra married.

After her husband's death Laxmibai lived in the three rooms

in premises No. 93-95, Shukrawar Peth, Poona, in which she

had been given a right of residence by her husband's will.

Her younger son Purshottam also appears to have gone out of

Poona on service in 1953, and he died in January 1954.

Since then Laxmibai had been living all by herself. She had

however certain relatives in Poona.

The appellant is a medical doctor. He and his brother B. C.

Lagu, also a doctor, had been the family physicians of Anant

Karve during his life time and attended him in his last

illness. After his death the appellant continued to be

Laxmibai's family doctor. It is clear from the evidence

that Laxmibai had great trust and confidence in the

appellant and depended on him in all matters concerning her

moneys and investments. It was he who went to the Bank for

withdrawing and depositing moneys for her. In 1955 he

actually took on rent a big hall in premises No. 93-95,

Shukrawar Peth for his personal use and had been in

occupation of it since then.

Laxmibai did not possess very good health. She had

developed a tuberculous lesion some twenty years before her

death but it had healed. She was a chronic diabetes patient

since 1946 and started having hysterical fits since 1939.

She suffered from menorrhagia and metrorrhagia since 1942.

On April 11, 1948, Dr. Ghorpure, a surgeon performed an

operation on her which is described in these terms:

Abdomen opened by mid-line sub-umbilical incision-Subtotal

hysterectomy done. Rt. ovary cysticpunctured-

Appendicectomy. Abdomen closed after exploring other

viscera which were normal.

In 1949 she suffered from pyorrhoea and had her teeth taken

out. In 1950 the tuberculous affection became active and on

June 15, 1950, she consulted Dr. Sathe, a lung specialist,

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who found that there was tuberculous

522

affection of the left lung and he recommended a line of

treatment. This treatment was carried out by the appellant

but apparently did not achieve much result. On July 13,

1950, she got herself admitted into the Wanlesswadi

Tuberculosis Sanatorium at Miraj in Bombay for treatment of

the tuberculosis. Two thoracoplasty operations were

performed on the left lung and she was recommended a third

such operation which she was unwilling to undergo and left

the hospital at her own desire. In the course of these

operations nine of her ribs on the left side were removed.

The report given by this hospital on November 17, 1950,

reads thus:

Patient was admitted on 13th July, 1950. X-Ray on admission

showed extensive filtration on the left side with a large

cavity in the upper zone; the right side was within normal

limits. She had diabetes with high blood sugar which was

controlled by insulin. Two stages of thoracoplasty

operation on the left side were done and there was good

clearing of disease but there was a small residual cavity

seen and the third stage operation was advised. The patient

is leaving at her own request against medical advice. Her

sputum is positive.

There is no evidence that after she left Wanlesswadi

Sanatorium she had any relapse of any of her previous

illnesses earlier recounted. It appears from the evidence

of her relation one Datar, a medical man, that Laxmibai had

been completely invalid being a frank case of tuberculosis

of both the lungs but in November 1956, her health was good

and she was cooking her food and moving about in the house.

The other evidence also shows that she was carrying on her

daily avocations of' life in a normal way at that time.

After her death her body was found to be well nourished.

She had however to have ordinary medical attention

constantly and the diabetes had continued though controlled.

The appellant treated her all along and the fees paid to him

appear debited to Laxmibai's account.

I have so far been stating the earlier history of the case

and now come to the more immediate events. On November 8,

1956, Laxmibai had Rs. 5,275-09 in her

523

account in the Bank of Maharashtra. On a date between

November 8 and 10, she signed two papers the first of which

was a notice to the Bank reading I desire to withdraw an

amount exceeding Rs. 1,000 up to about Rs. 5,000 in the next

week from My savings Bank Account" and the other was a

withdrawal slip or cheque and it read, " Pay Bearer the sum

of Rupees Five thousand only which please debit to the

2account of Laxmibai Anant Karve". None of these papers

bore any date and the, bodies of them, were in the

appellant's handwriting. These papers were made over by

Laxmibai to the appellant and he did not present them to the

Bank till after her death. On November 12, 1956, the

appellant paid to the credit of Laxmibai's account in the

Bank a dividend warrant dated November 10, 1956, for Rs.

2,607-6-0 drawn in her favour by a company on the Bank of

Maharashtra, after signing her name on the back of it

himself.

The appellant had fixed up an engagement with Dr. Sathe of

Bombay, who has been named earlier, for November 13, 1956,

at 3 p.m. for examining Laxmibai. On November 8, 1956,

Bhave, a relation of Laxmibai, called on Laxmibai and found

the appellant there. Laxmibai told him that she proposed to

go to Bombay with the appellant for consulting Dr. Sathe for

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her health and that she would be returning in four or five

days. On November 10 or 11, she saw a lawyer Karandikar,

also a relation, and informed him that she intended to go to

Bombay with the appellant for consulting a physician. About

the same time Champutai, daughter of Bhave mentioned

earlier, came to Laxmibai's house to invite her to attend

the birthday party of her son which had been fixed for

November 13. Laxmibai told Champutai that she was going to

Bombay and if she was able to come back in time, she would

attend the party. At about 8 p.m. on November 12, Laxmibai

went to Virkar, who was a tenant of the house where she

lived, and informed him that she was going to Bombay by the

night train to consult a doctor and requested him to pay Rs.

50 on account of the rent then due for meeting the expenses

of the

524

journey to Bombay. The amount was paid by Virkar to her.

She told Virkar that she expected to return to

Poona after three or four days. About the same time she met

Pramilabai, another tenant of the house, and told her that

she was going to Bombay with the appellant by the night

train to consult Dr. Sathe. A little later she was seen by

a third tenant Krishnaji, standing in front of the house

with a small bag and bedding. Krishnaji also saw the

appellant on the road going away from the house. All these

people have said that they found Laxmibai in a good state of

health and going about performing her normal avocations of

life. There was a passenger train leaving Poona for Bombay

at 10 p.m. Laxmibai and the appellant went by this train to

Bombay on November 12, 1956. Though the appellant denied

this, the Courts below have found that they travelled in the

same compartment. The train reached Victoria Terminus

Station, Bombay, at 5-10 a.m. on November 13. Laxmibai had

then gone into a comatose condition. The appellant procured

a stretcher and carried her into a taxi with the help of

porters and took her to Gokuldas Tejpal Hospital, usually

called for short G.T. Hospital, which is about six furlongs

from the station. They reached the hospital at about 5-45

a.m. Laxmibai was taken to the Outdoor Department where Dr.

Ugale, the Casualty Officer in charge, admitted her 'into

the hospital. According to Dr. Ugale, the appellant told

him that the name of the unconscious woman was Indumati

Paunshe and her age was forty. The appellant gave as the

address of the patient the address of his own dispensary at

Poona, namely, " C/o Dr. Lagu 20-B, Shukrawar, Gala No. 12,

Poona 2 ". Dr. Ugale said that the appellant at his request

spelt the name "Paunshe" and he took it down as spelt by the

appellant. On enquiry about the history of the patient by

Dr. Ugale the appellant told him that the patient suddenly

became unconscious in the train while coming from upcountry

and that there was a history of similar attacks frequently

before. Dr. Ugale also said that the appellant told him

that he thought that the case was one of hysterical fit from

525

which she frequently suffered. He did not tell Dr. Ugale

that the patient suffered from any other disease. He said

that he had brought the unconscious woman to Bombay for

getting her examined by a specialist and that she was his

patient. Dr. Ugale entered in the appropriate record of the

hospital called the case paper, all that the appellant told

him and what he himself had noticed. As a result of his own

examination Dr. Ugale found that the patient was making some

involuntary movement, the corneal reflex was absent, the

pupils were normal and reactive. He found nothing abnormal

in the cardiovascular system or the respiration. There was

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a clerk sitting by the side of Dr. Ugale when the appellant

was speaking to him and he made the necessary entries in

another record of the hospital. In that record the name of

the patient appears as Indumati Pankshe. Dr. Ugale examined

the person of Laxmibai and found no ornament or cash on her.

Within four or five minutes of the time that she arrived at

the Out door Department of the hospital, Laxmibai was

removed to Ward No. 12.

Dr. Anija, a young woman doctor, who had passed out the

previous June, was then the House Physician in attendance at

that ward. The appellant accompanied Laxmibai to the ward

and introduced himself to Dr. Anija as Dr. Lagu, which is

his name. He told her that while travelling in a train from

upcountry the patient had got unconscious and therefore he

had brought her straight from the station to the hospital

and that before the journey the patient was alright. He

further said that the patient had similar attacks before.

The appellant also told Dr. Anija that he was the family

physician of the patient and a family friend and spoke of

some of the illnesses from which the patient had earlier

suffered. Dr. Anija made some notes in the case paper of

what she heard from the appellant and then examined the

patient, the result of which she also similarly noted in the

case paper. Thereafter, according to Dr. Anija, she tested

the patient's urine in a laboratory attached to the ward and

recorded the finding on the case paper. She then

administered some stimulant and oxygen and also

67

526

gave an injection of 40 units of insulin as she

thought,' as a result of the urine test, that the case was

one of diabetic coma. There is some dispute as to whether

the urine was examined by Dr. Anija at this time and as to

when the entries on the case paper of the results of the

examination had been made. This will be discussed later.

Dr. Anija examined the urine of the patient for the second

time at about 8-30 a.m. and that also disclosed a certain

quantity of Sugar. She said that she then sent a call to

the Registrar of the ward, who was her immediate superior,

to come and see the case. The Registrar came and, according

to Dr. Anija, directed that the patient be given another 40

units of insulin with 20 c.c. of glucose by intravenous

injection and that she be also given " intra-gastric glucose

drip " and this was done at about 9 a.m. At about 11 a.m.

the HonorarY Visiting Physician, Dr. Variava, came to the

hospitals Dr. Anija told him that it was a case of diabetic

coma. Dr. Variava then himself examined the patient and

thereafter asked Dr. Anija why she thought it to be a case

of diabetic coma, to which Dr. Anija replied that she did so

because there was sugar present in the urine. Dr. Variava

then asked her whether she had examined the urine for

acetone to which she replied that she had not. Dr. Variava

thereupon reprimanded her by saying " How can you diagnose a

case of diabetic coma without ascertaining acetone in the

urine ?" Thereafter under the directions of Dr. Variava, Dr.

Anija again tested the urine and showed it to Dr. Variava

who thought that the urine contained a slight trace of

acetone. Shortly after this urine test the patient, that

is, Laxmibai expired. It was then about 11-30 a.m. Dr.

Variava then told Dr. Anija that he did not think that the

case was one of diabetic coma and that therefore he wanted a

postmortem examination of the body of the deceased. Dr.

Anija then made a note on the case paper stating " Asked for

postmortem " and put her signature below the entry. She did

not then put down anything in the column there about the

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final diagnosis. Dr. Variava did not wait to see the entry

about

527

postmortem being made by Dr. Anija but left to attend other

cases. It is clear that the appellant was present in the

hospital up to the time of the death Of Laxmibai though in

his statement in the trial Court he had denied this. There

is no evidence as to how long he remained in the hospital

after Laxmibai's death but it is clear that he was in Poona

on November 14.

There was arrangement in the hospital for conducting

postmortem examinations. The case papers along with note "

Asked for postmortem " had been sent by Dr. Anija to the

Resident Medical Officer of the hospital, Dr. Mouskar. It

was his duty to arrange for the postmortem examination. The

case paper came to Dr. Mouskar's office at 1 p.m. but he did

not proceed to make any arrangement for having a postmortem

examination held. Instead, at about 2 p. m. he sent an

official telegram to the appellant at Poona at the address

which he had given to Dr. Ugale and which was recorded in

the case paper. The telegrams was in these words:

" Indumati expired arrange removal reply immediately."

On November 14, the appellant wrote from Poona a letter in

reply to the telegram. This letter was in these terms:

" I have already telegraphed to the brother of Shrimati

Indumati Panshe at Calcutta, earliest he will reach Bombay

on the 15th November, 1956, Thursday. His name is Govind

Vaman Deshpande; he will enquire as Indumati Panshe. I have

seen the name of the patient entered in the Ward Book as

Indumati Pannshe as 'n' extra. Please correct' it. I am

writing all these things in connection of a case woman aged

30-35 years admitted in G. T. Hospital at 6 a.m. on Tuesday

13th November, 1956, and expired the same day at about 11

a.m. Shri Govind Vaman Deshpande will take the body and do

the necessary funeral function according to Hindu rites."

Laxmibai had in fact no brother of the name of Govind Vaman

Deshpande and in fact the appellant

528

had sent no telegram as he stated in the letter. The

statements in the letter were all false. The letter was

received in the office of Dr. Mouskar in the afternoon of

November 15.

Not having received any reply from the appellant to his

telegram, Dr. Mouskar on November 14, at about 4 p. m., sent

the following information to the Inspector of Police-A

Esplanade P. S., Bombay.

Sir,

I am to state that Smt. Indumati Paunshe, Hindu, female,

aged 40 years was admitted in Ward No.Xll for treatment of

hysterical fits on 13th November, 1956, at 5-45 a. m. She

died on the same day at 11-30 a.m.

The address given at the time of admission is as follows:

C/o Dr. Lagu,

20B, Shukrawar,

Gala No. 12, Poona-2.

A telegram on the above address has already been sent, but

without any response.

It is therefore requested that the body may please be

removed and taken to the J. J. Hospital Morgue for avoiding

decomposition."

A copy of this letter was sent to the Coroner for

information. The letter was written as in the G. T.

Hospital there was no air conditioned morgue and there was

one in the J. J. Hospital.

On receipt of this letter the police immediately wrote to

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the Coroner for permission to remove the body from the G. T.

Hospital to the J. J. Hospital. The permission was granted

by the Coroner at about 7-50 p.m. on the same day. The body

was thereupon removed from the G. T. Hospital to the J. J.

Hospital morgue at about 9 p.m. on November 14.

On the same day, that is, November 14, at about 9-30 p. m.

the police again wrote to the Coroner stating that it had

received a report from the Resident Medical Officer, G. T.

Hospital of the death of one Indumati Paunshe, referring

evidently to the letter which Dr. Mouskar had earlier on the

same day written to the

529

police,and that Indumati appeared to have no relatives in

Bombay and further that the cause of death was not certified

and requesting in the circumstances that an inquest over the

death might be held. What happened about this request will

be stated later.

On November 15, the Bombay police sent a wireless message to

the police at Poona intimating that on November 13, one

Indumati Paunshe, who had been admitted to the G.T. Hospital

for treatment of hysterical fits, had died on the very day

in the hospital and her address was " C/o Dr. Lagu, 20B,

Shukrawar, Gala No. 12, Poona 2 " and asking that enquires

might be made at the above address and the relatives might

be asked to claim the dead body which was lying unclaimed.

Pursuant to this message, the Poona police interviewed the

appellant at Poona on November 16, when he made the

following statement:

"On November 12 he left Poona for Bombay by the 10 p.m.

train and had gone off to sleep. Towards the end of the

journey when he started preparing to get down at Bombay, he

found one woman fast asleep. From other passengers he came

to know that her name was Indumati Paunshe about 35 years of

age and she had a brother serving in Calcutta. When other

passengers got down at Victoria Terminus Station in Bombay,

the woman did not awake. He thereupon looked at her keenly

and found her senseless. Being himself a doctor he thought

it his duty to take her to the hospital and so took her to

the G. T. Hospital in a taxi. As he had taken that woman to

the hospital, the Casualty Medical Officer took his address.

He had no more information about the woman. She was not his

relation and he was not in any way responsible for her."

The statement so made by the appellant was received by the

Bombay police from the Poona police on November 17.

I now come back to the events that were happening at Bombay.

I have earlier stated that the case paper had not initially

given the final diagnosis as to the

530

cause of Laxmibai's death but bore the endorsement "Asked

for postmortem ". At some stage, as to which the evidence

is conflicting and which I will have to discuss later, the

endorsement " Asked for postmortem " was crossed out and the

words "diabetic coma " were written on the case paper as

the caus of the death of the patient. Both of these

alterations had been made by Dr. Anija who put her signature

under the crossed out entry. Dr. Mouskar on November 15,

sent to the Coroner a certificate of the death of the

patient Indumati in the G. T. Hospital stating therein

diabetic coma as the cause of her death. By this time the

alteration in the case paper had clearly been made, crossing

out the direction as to postmortem examination and stating

therein diabetic coma as the cause of death. On the same

day, that is, November 15, the police wrote a letter to Dr.

Mouskar, apparently in ignorance of the death certificate

issued by him, requesting him to send per bearer the cause

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of the death of " Indumati ". This letter was sent with a

copy, the idea being that the original would be retained by

the Hospital and the copy returned with an acknowledgement

of the receipt of the original made on it. Both these were

however produced from the police custody without any

endorsement by the hospital acknowledging the receipt of

either. The copy bore the following remark, "Diabetic coma,

Dr. N. S. Variava, G. T. Hospital." It is clear on the

evidence that the endorsement had not been made by Dr.

Variava. Dr. Anija also denied having made it though before

the police she admitted that the words " Diabetic coma " had

been written by her. Dr. Mouskar said that neither the

original nor the copy had ever come to him and he thought

that the endorsement "Diabetic coma" might be in Dr. Anija's

hand writing but he could not say by whom the words "Dr.

N.S. Variava, G. T. Hospital" had been written adding that

the words " Dr. N. S. Variava " had not been written by Dr.

Variava. The question as to who made the endorsement will

be discussed later.

On receipt of the death certificate from Dr. Mouskar, the

Coroner's office made on the letter of the police

531

dated November 14, asking an inquest to be made, which I

have earlier mentioned, an endorsement directing that no

inquest was necessary as the Resident Medical Officer, G. T.

Hospital had certified the cause of death and had issued the

death certificate. On November 19, the Coroner's office

directed that the dead body might be disposed of as

unclaimed after taking a photograph of it. A photograph of

the dead body was duly taken on the same day. In the mean-

time the Grant Medical College had written to the Coroner on

November 17, for authority to take over certain unclaimed

dead bodies lying in the J.J. Hospital mortuary, for

dissection purposes and thereupon the Coroner made an order

directing that the dead bodies might be made over to the

Grant Medical College. Pursuant to this order, the dead

bodies, which included that of Laxmibai, were then made over

to the Grant ,Medical College on November 20, 1956. When

the dead body of Laxmibai was about to be taken to the

dissection hall, some scratches on the neck were detected.

The Professor of Anatomy of the College did not thereupon

allow the body to be dissected and brought the discovery to

the notice of the police. The police then wrote to the

Coroner that in view of this, a postmortem and an inquest

might be held. Accordingly, under the instructions of the

Coroner, Dr. Jhala, Police Surgeon, Bombay, held a

postmortem examination of the body of Laxmibai on November

23. He found no sign of decomposition in the body nor any

characteristic smell of any recognisable poison. He also

found the scratches on the neck to be postmortem. Dr. Jhala

sent the viscera to the Government Chemical Examiner who

sent the report of his examination on December 19, 1956,

wherein he stated that he was unable to detect any poison in

the viscera. Thereupon, Dr. Jhala submitted his postmortem

report stating that in his opinion death could have occurred

on account of diabetic coma. In the meantime, after the

postmortem examination, the body of Laxmibai had been made

over to the Hindu Relief Society for cremation on November

24 and the cremation had been duly carried out.

532

It is now necessary to go back to Poona and relate what the

appellant did after Laxmibai's death. To describe it

summarily, the appellant did not give any one the

information of Laxmibai's death but on the contrary.

represented that she was alive and moving about from

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place to place and in the meantime misappropriated most of

her moneys.

I will now give some details of his activities in

relation to Laxmibai's moneys. It will be remembered that

about November 8, the appellant had taken from Laxmibai a

notice to the Bank for withdrawal of money and a withdrawal

slip, none of which bore any date. The appellant inserted

on the notice of withdrawal the date November 15, 1956, and

lodged it in the Bank on the same day or soon thereafter.

On the withdrawal slip he inserted the date November 19,

1956, and on November 20, presented it to the Bank and drew

out a sum of Rs. 5,000 from Laxmibai's account. He

subsequently put in to the credit of her account diverse

cheques and by April 1957, bad drawn out by forging her

signature practically the whole amount in her credit

totalling about Rs. 10,000 including the sum of Rs. 5,000

withdrawn on November 20, 1956. The appellant also embarked

on a systematic course of forgeries of the signature of

Laxmibai on various fabricated documents, including share

transfer deeds, as a result of which, before the end of

1957, he misappropriated a large part of the liquid assets

belonging to Laxmibai's estate. When some of the forged

signatures of Laxmibai had been doubted by the authorities

to whom they had been presented with the object of being

acted upon, the appellant even went to the length of getting

a woman to falsely impersonate Laxmibai before a Magistrate

and thereby procured the latter to certify forged signatures

of Laxmibai as genuine signatures. He also clandestinely

denuded Laxmibai's flat of its entire contents. None of her

ornaments has been recovered after her death. In the

meantime, he had been falsely representing to various

persons, including all friends and relatives of Laxmibai,

that he had met her on several dates after November 13, when

she was already

533

dead. He manufactured various letters purported to be

written by her from distant places in India and addressed to

her relatives in Poona stating that she was going round on a

pilgrimage. Eventually, he fabricated letters purported to

have been written by her to her relatives in which it was

stated that she had married one Joshi and bad settled down

in a place called Rathodi near Jaipur -and did not intend to

return to Poona. There is in fact no place of the name of

Rathodi. His idea in manufacturing these letters was to

create a false impression in the minds of Laxmibai's friends

and relatives that she was still alive and this he did with

the object of gaining time to misappropriate her properties.

It is not necessary to go into the details of this part of

the conduct. The substance of it is that he made full use

of the situation arising out of Laxmibai's death to

misappropriate by all kinds of dishonest means most of her

properties and to facilitate the misappropriation

assiduously spread the story that she was alive. It may be

stated that the appellant was put on -his trial on charges

of misappropriation and other allied charges and found

guilty and sentenced to imprisonment for life.

The long absence of Laxmibai had gradually made her

relatives grow suspicious about her fate and they approached

the police but no trace of Laxmibai could be found. Several

petitions were sent to the higher police officers and also

to the Chief Minister of Bombay. In the end, the matter was

entrusted to Mr. Dhonde, Deputy Superintendent of Police, C.

I. D., Poona, for enquiry. Mr. Dhonde made various

investigations and eventually on March 13, 1958,

interrogated the appellant. The appellant then told him

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that be had taken Laxmibai to the G. T. Hospital, Bombay,

and admitted her there, and that she died there on November

13, 1956. The police made enquiries at the G. T. Hospital

and was able to find the clothes which Laxmibai wore when

she died. These were identified by Laxmibai's relations.

The photograph of the dead body of Laxmibai also helped to

prove her identity. After certain further enquiries, the

police sent up the

68

534

appellant for trial on a charge of murder of Laxmibai with

the result I have earlier mentioned.

The prosecution case is that the appellant caused the

death of Laxmibai by administering to her a poison which was

undetectable. On the evidence in this case it has to be

held, as the Courts below have done, that there are poisons

which cause death but are undetectable. I do not wish to be

understood as saying that death by poisoning cannot be

proved without proof of detection of poison in the deceased

person's system after his death. I quite agree that the

circumstances may be such that the only reasonable

conclusion that can be drawn is that death was an unnatural

death. In this view of the matter, I do not consider it

necessary to discuss the cases cited at the bar and in the

judgments of the Courts below. They are all illustrative of

the proposition that a crime can be proved by circumstantial

evidence, a proposition which I fully accept. In one of

them, namely, Regina v. Onufrejczyk(1) guilt was held proved

from the circumstances of the case notwithstanding that

there was no body or trace of a body, or any direct evidence

as to the manner of death of a victim. The legal

proposition that arises in the present case may be put in

the words of Wills in his treatise on Circumstantial

Evidence which has been quoted in the judgment of the High

Court:

It would be most unreasonable and lead to the grossest

injustice, and in some circumstances to impunity for the

worst of crimes, to require, as an imperative rule of law,

that the fact of poisoning shall be established by any

special and exclusive medium of proof, when that kind of

proof is unattainable, and specially if it has been rendered

so by the act of the offender himself. No universal and

invariable rule, therefore, can be laid down; and every case

must depend upon its own particular circumstances; and the

corpus delicti must, like anything else, be proved by the

best evidence reasonably capable of being adduced, and by

such an amount and combination of relevant facts, whether

direct or circumstantial, as to establish the factum

probandum

(1) [1955] 1 Q. B. 388.

535

to the exclusion of every other reasonable hypothesis. (7th

Ed., p.,385) ".

In the present case, therefore, the circumstances must be

such that no other conclusion than that Laxmibai died of

poisoning and that the poison was administered by the

appellant, can reasonably be drawn. The Courts below have

found that the circumstances of this case fully establish

this. I have come to a different conclusion. In my view,

the circumstances are not such that from them the only

reasonable conclusion to be drawn is that Laxmibai died of

poisoning. If that conclusion cannot be drawn, of course no

question of the appellant having poisoned her arises. I may

also say that if Laxmibai could be said to have died of

poisoning, I would have no reason to disagree with the view

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of the Courts below that it was the appellant who had

administered the poison.

I proceed now to consider the question whether Laxmibai had

died of poisoning. I do not suggest that poison had to be

found in her system. In my view, if it could be established

in this case that Laxmibai had died an unnatural death the

conclusion would be inevitable that that unnatural death had

been brought about by poison; no other kind of unnatural

death could be possible on the facts of this case.

The real question in this case then is whether Laxmibai had

died an unnatural death. I think the Courts below also

considered that to be the only question in this case. I

have earlier said that no poison was detected in the

postmortem examination. So far as direct evidence of the

cause of death goes, which in this case is all opinion

evidence, we have the evidence of three doctors. All that

Dr. Variava said was that death was not due to diabetic

coma. The Courts below have accepted this evidence and I

find no reason to take a different view. Then there is Dr.

Jhala, who conducted the postmortem examination. He had

stated in the port-mortem examination report that the cause

of death was diabetic coma. In his evidence in Court he

said that the opinion stated in his report was not based on

his pathological findings and that the proper way of

describing the cause of

536

death would be by stating " death by diabetes with

complications ". He also referred to certain complications

such as, atheroma of aorta with slight sclerosis of

coronary. In the end he was asked by the Court, " Would you

agree with the view that the proper opinion on the

pathological data available before you should have been that

the cause of death was not ascertainable or could not be

ascertained ?" His answer was, " My answer is that on

pathological data I would agree to the answer proposed. We

have however to see the clinical data also. " On the

clinical data he would have said that death was due to

diabetes with complications, but he conceded that that

opinion was somewhat speculative. These two doctors there-

fore did not suggest that death was due to any unnatural

cause. Dr. Variava did not in his evidence say that he had

directed the postmortem examination to be done because he

suspected any foul play. It would appear that be did not

suspect any foul play for he did not require the case to be

marked as a medico-legal case.

The most important direct evidence as to the cause of death

and on which the prosecution has greatly relied, is the,

opinion of Dr. Mehta who appears to be a medical man of some

eminence. All the papers connected with the illnesses of

Laxmibai and the postmortem examination report bad been

given to him and he had made a thorough study of them. The

net result of this study would appear from his evidence, the

relevant part of which I think it right now to set out. He

said:

" On a careful consideration of the entire material placed

before me I am definitely of the opinion that the cause of

death of Indumati Paunshe as mentioned in the case record

and the Coroner's inquest, viz., diabetic coma, cannot be

true. In my opinion, the cause of death may probably be due

to:

(1)Administration of some unrecognisable poison, i.e., some

poison for the detection of which there are no definite

chemical tests.

(2)Administration of some recognisable poison for which

there are chemical tests, but which tests

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537

could not be obtained on account of deterioration of the

poison remaining in the dead body which was kept in the

morgue for considerable time after death without postmortem

being performed and which was already undergoing

decomposition prior to the actual postmortem examination as

is clear from the absence of rigor mortis. Rigor mortis is

means stiffening of muscles. The above opinion that the

probable cause of death may be due to administration of

poison is further fortified by the fact that the postmortem

did not reveal any definite pathological lesion to account

for the sudden rapid death of the deceased.

The question then arises whether she died a natural death,

i.e., due to any other disease or diseased condition. The

postmortem notes do not show anything abnormal beyond

congestion of organ is and tubercular focus in the left

lung. Congestion of organs occurs in majority of the cases

after death of the person and particularly more so when so

many days have elapsed between death and postmortem

examination. Some decomposition is bound to be going on.

There is still possibility of death being due to poison in

spite of the fact that the poison was not detected in the

postmortem examination. Two reasons can be assigned for

non-detection of poison: (1) There are no definite chemical

tests for each and every poison. There are some poisons

which cannot be detected on chemical analysis. (2) There may

be a recognisable poison in the sense that there are tests

for its detection. But the poison may not be detected on

account of deterioration of the poison remaining in the body

for a considerable time before the postmortem examination

and it has undergone decom. position or oxidation...........

The possibility of death being due to poisoning cannot be

ruled out."

538

I do not think that the Courts below thought that the

evidence of Dr. Mehta established that death must have been

due to an unnatural cause. If they did, I find myself

unable to agree with them. The substance of Dr. Mehta's

evidence is that death may " probably be due to " some

poison, " the probable cause of death maybe due to

administration of some poison", the posibility of death

being due to poisoning cannot be ruled out. It will have

been seen that Dr. Mehta posed a question whether Laxmibai

had died a natural death. That question he did not answer

beyond stating that the postmortem examination did not show

anything abnormal beyond congestion of organs and a

tubercular focus in the left lung and that such congestion

of organs occurs in the majority of cases after death. It is

clear that Mr. Mehta could not say with conviction that

death had been caused by poisoning nor that death could not

have been due to natural causes. The net result of the

evidence of the medical experts is clearly that it cannot be

said with definiteness how death was caused. In this view,

nothing really turns on the fact that shortly prior to her

death Laxmibai was found to have been in good health, which

of course can only mean as good a health as a confirmed

invalid like her could have. It cannot be definitely

inferred from the fact that she was in good health that she

had not died a natural death. If such an inference was

possible, the doctors who gave evidence would have given a

clear opinion but this they did not.

In this state of the evidence the Courts below have

founded themselves on various circumstances of the case,

most of which I have earlier related, in coming to the

conclusion that Laxmibai bad met with an unnatural death.

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These circumstances I now proceed to consider.

The first thing that I wish to discuss is the fact that

after Laxmibai's death the appellant started on a systematic

career of misappropriating her assets. I am unable to

conclude from this that the appellant had caused her death.

It is reasonably possible to think that he made use of the

opportunity that came is way on Laxmibai's death to

misappropriate her

539

properties and had not caused her death. The fact that the

appellant deliberately kept back the information of

Laxmibai's death from her relatives and falsely created the

impression in their minds that she was alive, does not

advance the matter. This was clearly done with a view to

give him time in which to carry out his scheme of

misappropriating her properties. I quite concede however

that these circumstances may take on a different colour from

other circumstances, but I have found no such circumstance..

The next circumstance is the conduct of the appellant in

obtaining from Laxmibai her signatures on the undated notice

of withdrawal to the Bank and the withdrawal slip. The

bodies of these documents are in the handwriting of the

appellant. The Courts below have thought that the appellant

obtained the signatures of Laxmibai on blank papers and

filled them in the forms they now stand after the death of

Laxmibai and utilised them to misappropriate her moneys.

They came to this conclusion from the fact that these

documents were admittedly without dates and had been

subsequently dishonestly utilised. It has been held from

this that the appellant had during her life time a design on

her moneys and therefore it becomes likely that he caused

her death. I am unable to agree with this conclusion. It

would be difficult to hold from the fact that the appellant

had a design on Laxmibai's moneys that he had also a design

on her life or that her death was, an unnatural death. But

apart from that there is reason to think that when Laxmibai

signed these documents their bodies had already been written

up. That reason is this. It will be remembered that on

November 12, 1956, the appellant had put to the credit of

Laxmibai's account in the Bank a dividend warrant in her

favour for Rs. 2,607-6-0. The balance to the credit of her

account on November 12, 1956, became as a result of this

deposit, Rs. 7,882-15. Now it is obvious that if the

appellant had filled in the bodies of the notice of

withdrawal and the withdrawal slip after the death of

Laxmibai he would not have mentioned the amounts therein as

Rs. 5,000 but would have increased it to a

540

figure nearer the balance because he undoubtedly had set

about to misappropriate the moneys in that account and in

fact he actually withdrew almost the entire balance in that

account later by forging Laxmibai's signatures on other

appropriate documents. Therefore, it seems to me that the

bodies of the notice of withdrawal and the withdrawal slip

had been written out before Laxmibai put her signatures on

them.

Furthermore, the evidence clearly establishes that even

during Laxmibai's life time the appellant used to present to

the Bank cheques signed by Laxmibai for withdrawal of moneys

and signed on the reverse of such cheques in acknowledgement

of receipt of the moneys. He also used to deposit moneys in

the Bank to the credit of her account. It is quite possible

that the two documents mentioned had come into the

appellant's possession in the usual course of managing

Laxmibai's banking affairs. The fact that Laxmibai had not

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put dates on the documents would indicate that it was not

intended that they would be presented to the Bank

immediately for there is no reason to think that Laxmibai

had not noticed that the documents did not-bear any date.

She seems to have been quite a capable woman managing her

own affairs well. The Courts below have thought that there

was no need for her to have wanted to withdraw such a large

amount. The appellant said that she wanted to invest the

money if), some fixed deposit which would have yielded a

higher return but he actually lent it to a friend whom

however he refused to name. The Courts below have

disbelieved the appellant's case. Even so it does not seem

to me possible to hold that Laxmibai did not want to

withdraw any moneys and the appellant had fraudulently got

her to put her signatures on blankpapers. I have earlier

given my reason for this. It was not necessary for the

appellant to have got her to sign blank papers and there is

nothing to show that she would have done that even if the

appellant had asked her.

I may here mention that no adverse inference can be drawn

from the fact that the appellant put in the

541

dividend warrant to the credit of Laxmibai's account: it

proves no guilt. But it is said that the appellant forged

the name of Laxmibai on the back of it. The High Court

thought that this forgery proves that the appellant had

during the lifetime of Laxmibai entertained the intention to

misappropriate her property. I am wholly unable to see how

that conclusion could be reached from this or how in fact

the forgery proves anything against the appellant. By the

forgery, as it is called, the appellant was putting the

money into the account to which it lawfully belonged; he did

not ,thereby give it a different destination. Furthermore,

he need not have signed her name himself. In the normal

course Laxmibai would have signed it herself if asked to do

so and given it to the appellant for being sent to the

credit of her account. There is no reason to think that she

would not have signed it if the appellant had asked her to

do so. The dividend warrant was in Laxmibai's favour and

had been drawn on the Bank of Maharashtra. It was being put

to her credit in the same Bank. The Bank was therefore not

likely to scrutinise with any care the payee's signature on

the dividend warrant. That may have been nature reason why

it was left to the appellant to sign Laxmibai's name on the

dividend warrant for putting it into the Bank. But whatever

view is taken I cannot see how it helps at all in solving

any question that arises in this case. The trial Court

found it a riddle and did not rely on it.

Next, it is said that the appellant falsely denied that he

travelled in the same compartment with Laxmibai on their

journey to Bombay. The denial was no doubt false. But it

had been made at the hearing. He had admitted to the

doctors at the hospital and to the Poona police on November

16, 1956, that he and the deceased had travelled in the same

compartment. This falsehood therefore does not establish

that the death of Laxmibai was an unnatural death, a

question which I am now investigating. The fact that they

travelled in the same compartment may no doubt have given

him an opportunity to administer poison to her and to that

extent it is of course relevant,

542

It is also said that there was a hospital called St.

George's Hospital within a few yards of the Victoria

Terminus Station but the appellant took the unconscious

Laxmibai to the more distant G. T. ofHospital with an

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ulterior purpose. That purpose it is said was that in the

G. T. Hospital his friend Dr. Mouskar, was the Resident

Medical Officer and the appellant wanted to secure his help,

if necessary, in preventing the discovery of the crime that

he had committed. The appellant said that he chose the G.

T. Hospital as he was familiar with it but not with the St.

George's Hospital. This seems to me to be too insignificant

a thing. The St. George's Hospital was no doubt very near,

but the G. T. Hospital was not very far away either. There

is nothing to show that the appellant knew that Dr. Mouskar

was on duty on the day in question. There is neither any

evidence to show how much the two were friendly or how far

Dr. Mouskar would have gone to help the appellant.

Furthermore, as the appellant had administered a poison

which was undetectable, it is not clear what help he

anticipated he would require from Dr. Mouskar. Again, he

must have known that as the Resident Medical Officer, Dr.

Mouskar was not in charge of the treatment of patients in

the hospital but only performed administrative functions and

that the unconscious Laxmibai would have to be treated by

other doctors. It cannot be said that if these other

doctors found anything wrong, Dr. Mouskar could have done

much to help the appellant. So it seems to me impossible to

draw any inference against the appellant from the fact that

he had taken the unconscious Laxmibai to the comparatively

distant G. T. Hospital. It is then pointed out that when

Laxmibai was admitted to the G. T. Hospital, she had no

ornaments on her person and no moneys with her and even her

bag and bedding had disappeared. It is suggested that the

appellant had removed them and that this again proves that

he had conceived the idea of misappropriating her properties

even during her life time which supports the theory that he

caused her death. Now the bedding and bag can be dismissed

at once,

543

There is no evidence as to what they contained. They were

of small sizes. It is reasonable to think that in the bag

Laxmibai had taken a few wearing apparels which she might

need for her stay in Bombay which the evidence shows she

thought would not be of more than four days. The box and

the bedding, must, therefore, have been of very

insignificant value. As regards ornaments, the evidence is

that usually she wore certain ornaments which might be of

some value. None of the witnesses, however, who saw her the

day she left Poona, has said that they found ornaments on

her person. It is not at all unlikely that as she was going

to Bombay and was not sure where she would have to put up

there, she had as a measure of safety, taken off the

ornaments she usually wore, before she left Poona. Then

again, if the appellant had taken off the ornaments from the

person of Laxmibai he must have done it in the train or

while taking her to the hospital. Now it is too much to

assume that in the compartment in which they were travelling

there were no other passengers. The removal of the

ornaments would have been noticed by the other passengers or

if done later, by the stretcher bearers or the taxi driver.

None of these persons was called. Neither is there any

evidence that any search for them had been made. Therefore,

it seems to me that on the evidence on record it cannot be

said definitely that the appellant removed any ornaments

from the person of the unconscious Laxmibai. With regard to

the money, she must have brought some with her to meet her

expenses in Bombay. It is more than likely that she had

entrusted the moneys to the appellant for safety which the

appellant never returned. There is no evidence that she had

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more than Rs. 50 with her and there is no reason to think

that she was carrying a large sum. The disappearance of the

money does not prove that the appellant had conceived the

design of getting rid of her.

Then we find the appellant describing Laxmibai in the

Hospital by the name 'Indumati Paunshe'. It is said he did

this to prevent her identity being discovered after her

death and that this shows that he had

544

already poisoned her and knew that she was going to die.

Now, so far as the name Indumati is concerned, that was one

of her names. The -papers that the appellant maintained in

connection with Laxmibai's treatment show that he mostly

called her by that name and never called her Laxmibai. He

said that he was used to calling her by her maiden name of

Indumati Ponkshe and gave that name to Dr. Ugale by sheer

force of habit. Dr. Ugale however said that as he did not

follow the surname he asked the appellant to spell it and

took it down as spelt, namely, as " Paunshe ",. The

Appellant denies that he gave the name Paunshe but says he

said " Ponkshe ". The appellant's version receives support

from the fact that the hospital clerk who also took down the

name for another record of the hospital as the appellant was

giving it to Dr. Ugale, took it down as " Indumati Pankshe

". Therefore, there is some doubt whether Dr. Ugale heard

the name correctly. However that may be, I doubt if the name

Paunshe indicates that the appellant gave it with a view to

prevent disclosure of identity. It is said that his plan

was to disappear after Laxmibai's death so that her body

would become unclaimed and be disposed of as such. If that

were Bo, then nothing would turn on the name. It is only

when people came to know that a woman of the name of

Indumati Paunshe had died that the question as to who she

was would have &risen. In view of the fact that the

appellant had given Indumati's address as care of himself at

Poona, it would be known that she belonged to Poona. I am

very doubtful if an enquiry made at Poona for Indumati

Paunshe would have kept back the real identity. Indumati or

Laxmibai had disappeared mysteriously; her maiden name was

Ponkshe. People interested in her would surely have been

led by the name Indumati Paunshe to enquire if it was

Laxmibai Karve. So it seems to me that if the appellant had

really wanted that the woman he took to the hospital should

never be discovered to have been Laxmibai, he would have

used a totally different name. I am unable to hold that the

use of the name " Indumati Paunshe " is any clear evidence

of the guilty intention of the appellant. In this

connection I have to refer to the

545

appellants letter of November 14, 1956, to the G.. T.

Hospital in which he pointed out that in the hospital record

the name had been taken down as " Pannshe " that is s, with

an extra " n " and this should be corrected. By this time

the appellant had clearly conceived the idea that the news

of the death of Laxmibai should be prevented from becoming

public. He had also misled the hospital authorities by

informing them that Indumati's brother would arrive to take

over her body; as already stated, she had no brother.

Therefore this attempted correction in the name by deleting

the extra " n " is really irrelevant; the extra " n " would

not in any event have made the discovery of the identity of

the dead person easier. What led the appellant to make this

attempt cannot however be ascertained.

Then I have to consider the fact that the appellant told Dr.

Ugale that Laxmibai had become unconscious of a hysterical

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fit and she had a history of similar attacks before. It is

said that this story about hysterical fit is false and had

been conceived to hide the fact that she had been poisoned.

The appellant had denied that he had mentioned hysterical

fit to Dr. Ugale and said that he had only stated that she

had suddenly become unconscious. That he had mentioned

sudden onset of unconsciousness in the train is admitted by

Dr. Ugale. It is somewhat curious that the appellant would

have mentioned both " hysterical fit " and " patient

suddenly became unconscious in the train ". It is

significant that "hysterical fit" was entered in the case

paper by Dr. Ugale under the head " Provisional Diagnosis "

a thing, for which I think, the doctor in charge has some

responsibility. It may also be stated that Dr. Anija did

not, say that the appellant mentioned hysterical fit to her.

In these circumstances I have some doubt if the appellant

had in fact mentioned hysterical fit " to Dr. Ugale.

I will however proceed-on the basis that the appellant did

mention hysterical fit to Dr. Ugale. Now, there is evidence

that for nine years upto 1948 Laxmibai had suffered from

hysterical fits. There is no

546

evidence one way or the other whether she had such fits

thereafter. If she had not, the prosecution could have

easily produced evidence of it. The only evidence on which

the prosecution relied was that of Laxmibai's son,

Ramachandra. All that he said was that between 1943 and

1948 his mother suffered from fits and that in 1956 when he

had come to Poona for his marriage his mother was not

suffering -from fits. 'Now, Ramachandra does not appear to

have much knowledge of his mother's health. He did not even

know what kind of fits these were nor that his mother

suffered from diabetes. Apart from the nature of his

evidence, it has to be remembered that he was living

separtely from his mother since 1946 and was away from Poona

since 1952. It cannot therefore be said that it would have

been improbable for the appellant to have thought that

Laxmibai had a relapse of a hysterical fit.

I now come to the fact that the address of Laxmibai given by

the appellant to the hospital authorities was his own

address. It is said that he did so deliberately to ensure

all communications concerning her from the hospital coming

to him; that he knew that Laxmibai was going to die and

wanted that nobody else would know of her death. I find

some difficulty in appreciating this. I do not see what

communication could be addressed by the hospital authorities

to Laxmibai after her death or when she was lying ill in the

hospital. Further there was no other address which the

appellant could have given. Laxmibai lived alone in her

flat and when she was away, there would be no one there to

receive any communication addressed to her at that address.

Her only son Ramachandra was away from Poona. She was

clearly more friendly with the appellant than with her other

relatives, none of whom was a very near relative. In these

circumstances and particularly as he had taken Laxmibai to

Bombay it seems only natural that he would give his own

address. Again if he had given Laxmibai's own address, that

would have served his purpose as well for he had a room in

her house and because of his friendly relation with

547

Laxmibai, would have been in charge of her flat in her

absence as he in fact was. It would not have been difficult

for him to ensure that any letters that came 'for Laxmibai

would reach him. He could also have given an entirely false

name and address and disappeared from the scene altogether;

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the body of Laxmibai would then, whether there was

postmortem examination or not, have been disposed of in due

time as an unclaimed body and nobody would have ever known

what had happened to Laxmibai. Indeed, it is the

prosecution case that this was the appellant's plan and

things happened just as he had planned and that is why he

deliberately brought Laxmibai to the hospital and gave his

own address. What strikes me is that this plan would have

worked with any false address given. I am therefore unable

to think that the fact that the appellant gave his own

address is a circumstance which can be reasonably explained

only on the hypothesis of his guilt.

I come now to the most important circumstance on which the

Courts below have strongly rested their conclusion. It is

said that the endorsement made on the hospital case paper

reading " Asked for postmortem " under the direction of Dr.

Variava had been crossed out and under the heading " Cause

of death " in that paper the entry " diabetic coma " had

been interpolated. The Courts below have found that it is

the appellant who had procured these alterations to be made

with the help of his friend Dr. Mouskar. If this is so,

then no doubt it would be a very strong circumstance

pointing to the guilt of the appellant for the only

reasonable explanation of this act would be that he wanted

to prevent a postmortem examination which might reveal that

Laxmibai had been poisoned. As I have already said, the

alterations had no doubt been made. But in my view, there

is no evidence whatever to show that the appellant had

anything to do with them.

Before state my reasons for this view, it is necessary to

set out the relevant evidence on this point. Dr. Anija

admits that she made the alterations but she says that she

did it in these circumstances: After

548

she had made the endorsement "Asked for postmortem " on the

case paper, she asked the sister in charge of the ward to

send 'the case -paper to Dr. Mouskar whose duty it was to do

the needful as regards the postmortem examination, and

herself followed Dr. Variava on a round of the wards, which

took her about an hour. About 12-30 p.m. she proceeded to

Dr. Mouskar's office to make enquiries as to when the

postmortem examination was to be held. She met Dr. Saify,

the Registrar of Unit No. 1 of the hospital in which Ward

No. 12 was included, outside Dr. Mouskar's office. Dr.

Saify had the case paper in his hand and he told her that

Dr. Mouskar thought that there was no need for holding a

postmortem examination as the case had been treated as one

of diabetic coma and also asked her to cancel the direction

about the postmortem examination and to show in the column

meant for cause of death, " Diabetic coma ". As Dr. Saify

was her official superior, she accordingly carried out his

directions and made the alterations in the case paper as

required.

I will now refer to Dr. Mouskar's evidence on this aspect of

the case which was as follows: The case paper relating to

Laxmibai came to his office at 1 p.m. on November 13. At

that time the endorsement " Asked for postmortem " was still

there and diabetic coma had not been shown as the cause of

death. There was arrangement in the hospital for postmortem

examination but he did not proceed to arrange for it

immediately as on the face of it it was not a medico-legal

case nor a road-side case. It was the invariable practice

to ask for the permission of the Coroner for holding the

postmortem examination in all cases but before doing so it

was necessary in nonmedico-legal cases to get the permission

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of the relatives of the deceased for holding the postmortem

examination. In that view of the matter at 2 p.m. he sent

the telegram to the appellant at his address as appearing in

the case paper. He never met the appellant in the hospital.

On the next day, that is, November 14, about 4 p.m. he wrote

to the police to remove the dead body to their air-

conditioned morgue in the J. J. Hospital

549

for better preservation as no reply to the telegram had been

received. till then. He sent a copy of this letter to the

Coroner. On the morning of November 15, somebody from the

Coroner's office rang him up and asked him about the final

diagnosis. He thereupon sent the case paper through a ward

boy to Unit No. 1 with an oral message either to the

Honorary physician,, the Registrar or the Assistant Houseman

as to whether they were able to tell him about the final

diagnosis and whether they still insisted on postmortem

examination. He did this as there was no final diagnosis

uptil then and as the physicians often changed their minds

in a non-medico-legal case. After about half an hour the

case paper came back to him and he found that the final

diagnosis had been stated as " Diabetic coma " and the

endorsement "Asked for postmortem" had been crossed out. He

then wrote out the death certificate and sent it to the

Coroner.

The Courts below have disbelieved both Dr. Anija and Dr.

Mouskar as to their respective versions regarding the manner

in which the, case paper had been altered. It has to be

noticed that a art from the evidence of these two doctors,

there is no other evidence on this question. The Courts

below have held that the alteration was made by Dr. Anija at

the direction of Dr. Mouskar and that Dr. Mouskar had been

persuaded to give that direction by the appellant whose

friend he was, on a representation that he, the' appellant,

was the patient's old family doctor and knew the case to be

one of diabetic coma and that it would save the family

humiliation if the dead body was not cut up for a postmortem

examination. They also held that the alteration was made on

November 13, soon after the death of Laxmibai and before the

appellant had left Bombay for Poona. They have further held

that Dr. Mouskar- got the alteration made as a friendly act

for the appellant and that he was in no way a conspirator in

the crime. There is no direct evidence to support this

finding but it has been inferentially arrived at from the

evidence of these two doctors.

The reasons on which this finding is based may be thus

stated: (a) Dr. Mouskar was an old friend of the

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550

appellant; (b) both Drs. Anija and Mouskar had lied with

regard to this part of their evidence; (c) Dr. mouskar's

conduct after the death of Laxmibai and his evidence in

court showed that he wanted to assist the appellant; (d) Dr.

Anija being very much junior to Dr. Mouskar had been

prevailed upon by the latter to give false evidence; and (e)

lastly, that no 'one excepting the appellant could have been

interested in avoiding the postmortem examination.

As to the first reason, the only evidence on this question

is that of Dr. Mouskar. All that he said was that in 1934

he and the appellant had studied Inter Science in a college

in Poona together and that he had stayed in Poona for three

different periods, namely 1922-26, 1931-36 and 1948-51. He

also said that while studying together he had come to know

the appellant by name but had never talked to him and had

never come in contact with him since 1934. The Courts below

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have disbelieved the later part of the evidence of Dr.

Mouskar and have held that he and the appellant were

friendly. This finding does not seem to me to be based on

strong grounds. No reason has been given as to why Dr.

Mouskar should be disbelieved. The prosecution led no

evidence to show that the two were friendly. No witness has

been found to say that the two were seen talking to each

other in the hospital. It has not been noticed, that the

difference in age between the two was twelve years.

I will take the, next three reasons together. They are that

Drs. Anija and Mouskar had both lied and that the conduct

and the evidence of Dr. Mouskar showed that he wanted to

help the. appellant and lastly, that Dr. Anija gave false

evidence only as she dared not estrange Dr. Mouskar who held

a much higher position. There is no doubt that Dr. Anija

told lies. The first lie was that she had tested the urine

at 6-30 a.m. for acetone. She also interpolated into the

case paper an entry showing that she had found acetone in

the urine which she said she examined at 6-30 a.m. Dr.

Variava said that he took her to task for diagnosing the

case as diabetic coma without having tested the urine for

acetone, which she told him she had not

551

that acetone had been found on the first examination of

urine was not there when he saw it at about 11 a.m. The

second lie which Dr. Anija said was that she put through a

telephone call to Dr. Variava about 7 a.m. and told him

about the symptoms she had found and that she had been

giving insulin. She said that Dr. Variava agreed with her

diagnosis and asked her to continue the treatment she had

started. That this is untrue, will appear from the fact

that Dr. Variava denied that this talk had taken place. Dr.

Variava's recollection is supported by the fact that on

arrival at the hospital he doubted if the case was of

diabetic coma and the treatment given was the correct one.

Further, there is a call book in the hospital on which

telephone calls made by the house physicians are entered.

There is no entry there showing a call having been made by

Dr. Anija on Dr.Variava. The third lie that she said was

that it was Dr. Saify who told her outside Dr. Mouskar's

office to make the alteration in the case paper. It has

been clearly established that Dr. Saify was not on November

13 in Bombay at all. He was then on leave and in Indore.

I come now to Dr. Mouskar. No' art of his evidence has been

directly found to be false. The Courts below have

disbelieved him on improbabilities. The first improbability

they found was in Dr. Mouskar's explanation that he did not

arrange for the postmortem examination immediately as he

considered the permission of the Coroner and the relatives

of the deceased necessary before holding the postmortem

examination and that this was the invariable practice in

non-medico-legal cases. I do not know why it should be said

that this practice is improbable. The prosecution did not

lead any evidence to show that there was no such practice as

spoken to by 'Dr. Mouskar. That the Coroner's permission

had to be taken would be borne out by the fact as appearing

in the correspondence, that the police asked the Coroner to

hold an inquest as the cause of death was not known. The

Courts below referred to the telegram that Dr. Mouskar sent

to the appellant at about 2 p.m. on November 13 and observed

that if Dr. Mouskar had delayed the postmortem examination

only in order to obtain the

552

consent of the relatives, then the telegram would not have

asked the appellant to arrange for the removal of the dead

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body. Dr. Mouskar said that he had intended to ask for the

permission to hold the postmortem examination when the

appellant appeared on receipt of his telegram. The Courts

below have not accepted this explanation. It does not seem

to me that this explanation is so absurd that it must be

rejected. No other view would fit in with the circumstances

of the case. This I will explain now.

It has to be remembered that the finding of the Courts below

is that Dr. Mouskar was not in any sense a conspirator with

the appellant in the crime. The learned Advocate General of

Bombay, who appeared for the respondent, also made it clear

that he did not suggest that Dr. Mouskar was in any

conspiracy. On the evidence on the record it would be

impossible to hold that Dr. Mouskar was in any conspiracy

with the appellant. There is no reason whatever for him to

have done that. There is no evidence of such friendship

between the appellant and Dr. Mouskar from which it can

possibly be inferred that Dr. Mouskar would have become a

party to secreting a diabolical crime committed by the

appellant. The trial Court expressly held, "I do not think

that at that time Dr. Mouskar realised that there was

anything suspicious about the death of Laxmibai, nor do I

think that he was aiding or abetting the suppression of

truth by cancelling the postmortem examination. " The High

Court also took the same view. We then come to this that if

Dr. Mouskar had procured the cancellation of the direction

for postmortem examination, he had done so without thinking

that there was anything suspicious about the death of

Laxmibai, and only to oblige his friend, the appellant, by

saving the family of the; deceased from humiliation by

cutting up her body. Now that being so, when Dr. Mouskar

got the direction cancelled at the appellant's request, he

would naturally expect the appellant to take charge of the

body and to remove it for cremation. Evidently, the

appellant had disappeared for otherwise Dr. Mouskar would

not have sent him a telegram to Poona. What would.have been

the normal reactions then of an

553

innocent man in Dr. Mouskar's position? He would have been

very much surprised. He would have thought that he had been

let down. It is not too much to think that he would have

grown suspicious. As an innocent man, as he has been found

to be, the only thing he could then possibly have done was

to have restored the direction for postmortem examination

and to proceed to take steps to have it held. I cannot

imagine that an innocent man in such circumstances would

have acted otherwise. It will be remembered that the

appellant's reply to the telegram was not received for over

two days and in the meantime Dr. Mouskar did nothing in the

matter. I find it impossible to hold that Dr. Mouskar,

innocent as he was, would have waited all this time and done

nothing about the postmortem examination at all. It would

have been impossible for him then to have asked if the

doctors in charge of the case still wanted a postmortem

examination as he actually did. If he was not a party to

any conspiracy with the appellant, I cannot think it

possible for him to have sent the telegram to Poona asking

the appellant to remove the body after he had been

innocently made to obtain a cancellation of the direction

and found that the appellant had disappeared. I may also

add that if the appellant had duped Dr. Mouskar and procured

him to obtain a cancellation of the direction for postmortem

examination, it would be extremely unlikely for him to have

taken the risk of disappearing from the hospital without

making any arrangement for the disposal of the body for then

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he could not be sure ,whether the postmortem would be held

or not. It would have been more natural for him to have

taken over the body and cremated it. That would not have

affected his design, as alleged by the prosecution, to have

evidence of the natural death of Laxmibai created and to

have kept back the know]-edge of her death from her

relatives. I therefore think that the telegram instead of

showing that Dr. Mouskar had already obtained a cancellation

of the direction for postmortem examination rather indicates

that that direction had not till then been cancelled as is

Dr. Mouskar's own evidence. This makes the explanation

554

of Dr. Mouskar as to why he sent the telegram a very

probable explanation.

Now, there are other things which would support Dr.

Mouskar's evidence. On November 14, about 4 p.m. he wrote

to the police intimating them that a Hindu female named

Indumati Panshe who had been admitted into the hospital on

November 13 at 5-45 a.m. for treatment of hysterical fits

had died the same day at 11-30 a.m.' He further stated in

that letter that a telegram had been sent to the address

given at the time of the admission of the patient but

without a response and requested that the dead body might be

removed to the J. J. Hospital morgue. This would indicate

two things. First, that Dr. Mouskar was surprised at having

received no answer from the appellant to his telegram and

that being so, if he had been innocently induced to get the

case paper altered, he would not have permitted the

alteration to remain there. The second thing it shows is

that Dr. Mouskar even in the afternoon of November 14

referred to hysterical fits as the illness of the patient.

This would be impossible if the prosecution case is true,

namely, that at about 1 p.m. on November 13, Dr. Mouskar had

procured Dr. Anija to state in the case paper that the cause

of death was diabetic coma.

The next thing that the Courts below have found against Dr.

Mouskar is that his story of having received a telephone

call from the Coroner's office on the morning of November 15

asking for the final diagnosis of the case was unbelievable.

I find no reason to disbelieve Dr. Mouskar. His evidence is

strongly supported by the death certificate which he issued

on that date stating diabetic coma as the cause of death.

There is no reason to think that Dr. Mouskar would have

issued this certificate on the 15th unless he had been asked

about the cause of death. Furthermore, the police on that

date had actually wanted to know the cause of death as will

appear from their letter of November 15. If the police

could ask, I do not see why the Coroner's office could not.

In that letter the police asked Dr. Mouskar to send per

bearer the cause of death to enable them to dispose of the

dead body. I have earlier referred to this letter. It is on

a copy

555

of this that the endorsement " Diabetic coma, Dr. N. S.

Variava, G. T. Hospital" had been made. There is no other

explanation as to why Dr. Mouskar sent the death certificate

on this date and not on any other date. Indeed, if he was

under the impression that the appellant or a relative of the

deceased would come and take charge of the-body for

cremation, as the prosecution case must be, then he would

not have issued the death certificate for that was wanted

only to enable the police to dispose of the dead body.

Therefore it seems to me likely that Dr. Mouskar had been

asked by the Coroner about the cause of death. Now if he

was so asked, it does not strike me as wholly improbable

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that he asked the physicians in charge whether they were

then in a position to state the cause of death or still

insisted on a postmortem examination. It has to be

remembered that till then no suspicion attached to the

case.. Dr. Mouskar said that he had seen the physicians

change their opinion in such matters and had therefore asked

whether a postmortem examination was still required. It has

also to be remembered that Dr. Mouskar had no knowledge that

the direction for postmortem examination had been given by

Dr. Variava. All that he knew was that such a direction

appeared over the signature of Dr. Anija. It does not seem

to me improbable that Dr. Mouskar on being asked by the

Coroner to state the cause of death would have enquired of

the physicians in charge about it. If this version is not

true, then the only other probable theory would be that the

alteration in the case paper had been made at 1 p.m. on

November 13, which as I have earlier said, cannot be

accepted in view of the telegram and the other records in

this case. It was also said that Dr. Mouskar's version

cannot be accepted for it was not possible for him to make

enquiries about the cause of death through a ward boy. I

think this would be too insignificant a ground for

disbelieving Dr. Mouskar.

I may now deal with the letter of the police dated November

15 to Dr. Mouskar asking for the cause of the death. It

will be remembered that this letter was sent along with a

copy of it and on the copy the endorsement " Diabetic coma,

Dr. W. S. Variava.

556

G. T. Hospital " had been made. Dr. Mouskar denied that

these letters ever came to him. The Courts below have been

unable to accept his denial. Their view is that it is Dr.

Mouskar who got the endorsement set out above, to be made

and is falsely denying it. I am unable to appreciate why

Dr. Mouskar should falsely deny it. He was innocent. He

had on that date issued the death certificate. He could

easily have admitted the fact, if he had made the

endorsement or got it made. Now it seems to me that there

is no evidence that the letter was produced before Dr.

Mouskar. In normal course, as spoken to by police Inspector

Kantak, who had written this letter, the original would have

been retained at the office of Dr. Mouskar and only the copy

would have come back to the police with an acknowledgment of

the receipt of the original endorsed on it. That did not

happen. Both the copy and the original were received back

by Kantak. The bearer who was sent to deliver the letter

was not called. There is therefore no evidence whatever

that the letters were actually delivered or what had

actually happened. On the contrary, the return of both

copies to the police would show that they had not been

delivered to Dr. Mouskar for if the letter had been deliver-

ed, then there is no reason why Dr. Mouskar would not have

given a formal reply to it stating that diabetic coma was

the cause of death. He would have had no difficulty in

doing so because on the same day he sent the death

certificate mentioning diabetic coma as the cause of death.

He had no reason to take to subterfuge and to get the words

" Diabetic coma. Dr. N. S. Variava. G T. Hospital "

written on the copy by somebody. It would therefore appear

that there is no reason to disbelieve Dr. Mouskar when he

said that he bad not received the letters and had nothing to

do with the endorsement made on the copy of the letter.

What might have happened was that the death certificate

having been earlier issued, some clerk in the office

returned these letters and by way of an informal

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communication of the cause of death made the endorse. ment

on the copy. It may be stated here that Dr. Anija admitted

to the police that the words " Diabetic coma " in the

endorsement had been written by her

557

but in court she denied that she had written them. This is

another instance which makes me greatly doubt her veracity.

It may be that she had written the words " Diabetic coma "

and got some one else to write out the rest of the

endorsement.

I come now to the last fact which the Courts below have

thought fit to disbelieve, in the evidence of Dr. Mouskar.

I have earlier mentioned that when Laxmibai was lying

unconscious in Ward No. 12, Dr. Anija had sent for the

Registrar. Dr. Anija stated that the Registrar whom she

sent for was Dr. Saify. This is untrue for, as I have

already said, it has been proved clearly that Dr. Saify was

not in Bombay at all on that day. Now it appears that the

hospital kept a call book in which a House Physician wanting

to call the Registrar would make an entry and send it to the

Registrar. This call book was produced on September 2,

1958, and it showed that Dr. Anija had herself written down

the name of Dr. Shah as the Registrar whom she was calling.

What therefore had happened was that Dr. Saify being away on

leave to the knowledge of Dr. Anija, she had sent the call

to Dr. Shah. This call book conclusively proves that Dr.

Anija's statement that she had been told by Dr. Saify, the

Registrar, to make the alteration in the case paper is

false. Dr. Mouskar had said in his evidence that he could

not trace this call book. The Courts below have thought

that he was lying and was deliberately preventing this call

book from coming to light so that Dr. Anija might not be

contradicted by her own writing that it was Dr. Shah whom

she had sent for which in its turn would show that her story

that it was Dr. Saify who had asked her to make the

alteration in the case paper was false. Now Dr. Mouskar's

evidence was concluded on August 25, 1958, and he had

retired from the office of the Resident Medical Officer on

August 14 preceding. Dr. Anija's evidence was taken down on

August 18 and August 19, 1958. 1 do not see why if the call

book was considered to be of that importance, the police

could not produce it after Dr. Mouskar had left office. It

was actually produced from the hospital and must have been

lying there all the time. The next thing to be noticed is

that there is

558

nothing on the record to show that Dr. Mouskar was

interested in establishing that Dr. Saify was on duty on

November 13 and therefore prevented the call book from being

produced. In fact, Dr. Mouskar in his evidence about Dr.

Saify stated that " he was not working in the hospital on

the 13, 14 and 15 November., I think also that he was not

staying in his quarters during that period and I did not see

Dr. Saify on these days at all." Therefore, there is no

basis for suggesting that Dr. Mouskar deliberately prevented

the production of the call book. I may here state that

there is nothing in the evidence of Dr. Mouskar which goes

to show that he was supporting Dr. Anija in any of her lies.

The Courts below have excused the lies of Dr. Anija in the

view that she had told them as she dared not estrange Dr.

Mouskar. Again, there seems to me to be no basis for this

finding. There is nothing on the record to show that Dr.

Anija expected anything from Dr. Mouskar or would have been

in any difficulty if she had told the truth even at the risk

of putting Dr. Mouskar in a difficult situation. There is

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no evidence that Dr. Anija had any talk directly with Dr.

Mouskar concerning the case of the unconscious Laxmibai and

therefore she could not and did not directly contradict

anything that Dr. Mouskar said. Again, it is clear from the

evidence that Dr. Anija had left the hospital on January 31,

1957. She had worked there without any remuneration. There

is no evidence that she had anything to do with the hospital

or its Resident Medical Officer, after she had left the

hospital. Again, on the date that Dr. Anija gave evidence,

Dr. Mouskar had already retired from his office at the

hospital. In these circumstances, I find no justification

for the conclusion that Dr. Anija had lied only out of fear

of Dr. Mouskar. I might also point out that the only lie in

Dr. Anija's evidence which the Courts below thought she said

out of fear or at the persuasion of Dr. Mouskar was her

statement that it was Dr. Saify who had told her that Dr.

Mouskar had wanted the direction as to postmortem

examination crossed out and diabetic coma written as the

cause of death. I have earlier stated that dr. Mouskar has

gone against this part of

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Dr. Anija's evidence by saying that Dr. Saify was not in

Bombay on the day in question. It is clear therefore that

it was not Dr. Mouskar who had wanted that Dr. Anija should

interpose Dr. Saify between him and her in the matter of the

direction for altering the case paper. Further, if Dr.

Mouskar really wanted that Dr. Anija should put the blame

for the alteration on somebody else, then Dr. Anija would

not have mentioned that Dr. Saify told her that Dr. Mouskar,

had wanted the alteration. She would simply have said that

it was at Dr. Saify's order only that she made the

alteration or put the responsibility on Dr. Shah. The

Courts below have been unable to explain why Dr. Anija

brought in Dr. Saify at all. I think this is capable of an

explanation as I will show later. The net position

therefore is that Dr. Anija was clearly lying; there is no

clear proof that Dr. Mouskar had lied at all. On the

contrary, his evidence and conduct would seem to be

consistent with the contemporaneous record and there is no

material on which it can be found that Dr. Anija told the

lies as she was afraid of Dr. Mouskar.

I come now to the last reason on which the Courts below

found that it must have been the appellant who procured the

alteration in the case paper. It has been said that no one

else was interested in getting that done. I take it that

this does not mean a finding that the appellant was

interested in getting the alteration made for then of course

his guilt would already have been assumed. What it means is

that if it is not possible to find reasonably that any one

else was interested in getting the alteration made, then it

would fit in with the theory that the appellant had

committed the crime and therefore was interested in getting

the alteration made. The real question is, can it be

reasonably said on the evidence that there was no one other

than the appellant who could be interested in getting the

alteration made ? I think it cannot. On the facts

established and without making any assumption one way or the

other, it seems to me very probable that it was Dr. Anija

who was interested in preventing the postmortem examination

and therefore in making the interpolations on the case

paper. I will now state m reasons for this view.

560

I have earlier stated that Dr. Anija examined the urine of

the patient at 6-30 a.m. on November 13. There is an entry

with regard to it in the case paper, which reads 'Sugar + +

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+ Albumin-Acetone + + There is little reason to doubt that

Dr. Anija did examine the urine at that time for sugar, for

otherwise she was not likely to have started the insulin

injections. She gave two of these, one at 6-30 a.m. and the

other at about 9 a.m. Dr. Variava's recollection is that

when the case paper was shown to him about 11 a.m. the entry

"Sugar + + + Albumin-" was there but the entry " Acetone + +

" was not there and that Dr. Anija told him that she had not

examined the urine for acetone. The entry " Acetone + + "

was clearly interpolated in the case paper later. It

wasbecause she had not tested the urine for acetone but had

none the less started the treatment for diabetic coma that

Dr. Variava had taken her to task and asked her to test the

urine for acetone. All this clearly shows that Dr. Anija had

interpolated the entry " Acetone + + " at some later time.

The trial Court thought that Dr. Mouskar having invented the

theory of diabetic coma " must have also thought it

necessary to make entries regarding the presence of acetone

+ +. in the case record " to support this false diagnosis.

This is nobody's case. Such a finding would necessarily mean

that Dr. Mouskar was in conspiracy with the appellant to

hide the crime by creating evidence in support of natural

death of the patient. The findings of the trial Court that

Dr. Mouskar was innocent and that he had procured Dr. Anija

to make the -entry " Acetone + + " cannot stand together.

The latter ending must be rejected as it is purely

inferential. The High Court did not find that the entry "

Acetone + + " had been made by Dr. Anija at the persuasion

of Dr. Mouskar. But it appears to have taken the view that

Dr. Anija having been induced by Dr. Mouskar to state

diabetic coma as the cause of death, herself incorporated

before the papers were submitted to the Coroner an entry

with regard to the examination of the urine in the case

paper and in that entry included " Acetone + + ". Whether

the High Court is right in its view that the entire entry as

to the result

561

of urine test at 6-30 a.m. of November 13, 1956, had been

made in the case paper later is a matter which I need not

discuss. The only question is who made the entry " Acetone

+ + " and when. I may state here that the papers were sent

to the Coroner at the time Of the postmortem examination,

namely,, on November 22, 1956. According to the High Court,

therefore, the entry " Acetone + + " had been made by Dr.

Anija on her own and Dr. Mouskar had nothing to do with it

and that Dr. Anija made the entry not at about 1 p.m. on

November 13, 1956, when she crossed out the direction for

postmortem examination and wrote out diabetic coma as the

cause of death but almost nine days later. The High Court

did not accept that part of Dr. Mouskar's evidence where he

said that he was positive that the entry " Acetone + + " was

in the case paper when it reached him at 1 p.m. on November

13. Earlier he had said that he had not read the case paper

fully when it first came to him. Dr. Mouskar was plainly

making a mistake. It is nobody's case that it was then

there. Even on the prosecution case it was added sometime

later, that is, when after the receipt of the case paper Dr.

Mouskar had been persuaded by the appellant to procure a

cancellation as to the direction for postmortem examination.

We then come to this that the entry " Acetone + +" had been

made by Dr. Anija on her own. If she did this, she must

have had some reason for it. I cannot imagine that reason

being anything else excepting to create evidence in support

of her diagnosis of diabetic coma. The next lie which Dr.

Anija spoke and which I wish now to refer, is the false

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story of her telephone talk with Dr. Variava at about 7 a.m.

She said that she then informed Dr. Variava about the

condition of the patient and that she had started insulin

injection and further that Dr. Variava told her to continue

the treatment. I have earlier said that this statement was

a clear falsehood and given reasons for this view. It is

nobody's case, and it could not be, that Dr. Mouskar had

asked her to tell this lie. Why then did she do so? Again,

the only possible reason that I can think of is the same

that I have given earlier, namely, that she was keen on

'creating evidence in support of the line of treatment that

she had given to

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the patient. She had been treating the patient as a case of

diabetic coma. It is clear from her evidence and of course

from that of Dr. Variava, that he had reprimanded her for

adopting that line of treatment without having tested the

urine for acetone. She had clearly made a mistake in the

treatment of the case and this might have put her in a

difficulty with the hospital authorities and also in her

future professional career. It was clearly her interest to

see that her mistake was not finally established as a result

of the postmortem examination which had been directed by Dr.

Variava. In these circumstances, she was under a great

temptation to prevent the postmortem examination which might

have revealed her mistake. It must be remembered that she

had just started on her professional career and was a very

young person. I am unable therefore to hold that, apart

from the appellant there was no one else who could have been

interested in crossing out the direction as to postmortem

examination and inserting diabetic coma as the cause of

death. In the circumstances that I have mentioned, it seems

quite probable that Dr. Anija had made the alteration in the

case paper entirely on her own and to save herself from the

possible effects of her mistake. It also seems probable to

me that Dr. Anija had made the alterations on November 15,

when Dr. Mouskar had sent the case paper through the ward

boy for ascertainment of the cause of death.

I have earlier said that Dr. Anija had falsely introduced

Dr. Saify as the person who had told her that Dr. Mouskar

had wanted the direction as to postmortem examination to be

crossed out and diabetic coma to be stated as the cause of

death. I have also said that Dr. Mouskar did not support

Dr. Anija as to the presence of Dr. Saify in the hospital on

the day in question. Why then did Dr. Anija introduce the

name of Dr. Saify ? I have said that the Courts below have

not been able to find any explanation as to why Dr. Anija

introduced the name of Dr. Saify. It seems to me that when

the alteration which she had made on her own, was found out

in the course of the investigation, she had to give some

explanation as to why she had made it. She thought of

saying that she did it under the orders of Dr. Mouskar who

was very

563

much her senior and whom she was bound to obey. But she

also realised that Dr. Mouskar was sure to deny that he had

asked her to make the alteration and as against his, her

evidence was not likely to be accepted. It was therefore

that she hit upon the idea of interposing Dr. Saify in

between her and Dr. Mouskar in the hope that Dr. Saify being

also a very young person, there was some chance of her

evidence being accepted as against his. Apart from that

there does not appear to be any other explanation as to why

Dr. Anija introduced the name of Dr. Saify. She had clearly

forgotten while inventing this story that Dr. Saify was away

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on leave but that of course makes no difference for if she

had remembered it, she might have named somebody else,

probably Dr. Shah or Dr. Patel who worked in Unit No. 2 of

the Hospital. Then it has to be remembered that Dr. Anija

admitted to the police that she had written out the words "

Diabetic coma " on the letter from the police of November

15, asking for the cause of death and this she later denied.

All this would make more probable the view that it was Dr.

Anija who in order to prevent the detection of the mistake

made by her in the treatment of Laxmibai had the endorsement

"Asked for post-, mortem " crossed out and inserted in the

case paper diabetic coma as the cause of death and that she

had not been asked by Dr. Mouskar to make the alteration in

the case paper.

I think it right to state here that it cannot be said that

Dr. Shah was also to blame for the wrong diagnosis of

diabetic coma. Dr. Anija said that pursuant to her call the

Registrar came at about 8-45 a.m. and approved of her

diagnosis and advised a further insulin injection of 40

units. She also said that the Registrar wrote on the case

paper the words "Inj. Insulin 40 units Iv. glucose 20 c.c."

By " the Registrar " she was of course referring to Dr.

Saify. It is clear from the call book that it was Dr. Shah,

who was the Registrar of Unit No. 2 who had been sent for by

Dr. Anija. Dr. Shah said in his evidence that he must have

gone to the patient pursuant to the call but he had no

recollection of the case at all. He denied that the entry "

Inj. Insulin 40 units Iv. glucose 20 c.c."was in his hand

writing. Dr. Patel who was

564

officiating as the Registrar of Unit No. 1 in the absence of

Dr. Saify on leave, also denied that that entry was in his

handwriting. Dr. Shah said from the sequenceof time noted

in the call book and the case paper, that he must have gone

to the ward before 6-30 a.m. According to Dr. Shaw he could

not have seen the case paper when he called because he was

not the Registrar of Unit No. 1. He admitted that he must

have advised Dr. Anija, about the case. What the advice was

we do not know. It is clear however that Dr. Anija had

started treating the case as diabetic coma and given 40

units of insulin before she sent for the Registrar. Indeed

according to her, the Registrar, who must have been Dr.

Shah, arrived at 8.45 a.m. So we get that Dr. Anija started

treatment of diabetic coma and gave insulin prior to 6-30

a.m. and her statement that the Registrar wrote down the

direction for a second insulin injection of 40 units at 8-45

a.m. is false. It is therefore clear that the treatment

given to the unconscious Laxmibai had been under the

judgment of Dr. Anija alone. It would follow that Dr.Shah

had no responsibility for that treatment. This is also

supported by the fact that Dr. Anija did not tell Dr.

Variava that Dr. Shah had also thought it to be a case of

diabetic coma.

There is another circumstance against the appellant which

must now be noticed, and that is that the appellant left the

hospital soon after the death of Laxmibai without showing

the least care as to what happened thereafter. This conduct

considered with the appel. lant's letter of November 14,

1956, stating falsely that " Indumati's " brother would come

to take over her body and further considered with the

subsequent conduct of the appellant in fraudulently

misappropriating the deceased Laxmibai's money clearly

indicates that immediately after the death of Laxmibai the

appellant had conceived the idea of misappropriating her

properties. It has been suggested that it would be somewhat

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strange that the dishonest intention cropped up in the

appellant's mind so suddenly and therefore it is reasonable

to think that he had entertained that design even during the

lifetime of Laxmibai. The Courts below have accepted that

suggestion. I cannot say that that is an unreasonable view

to take.

565

But supposing the appellant had during Laxmibai's lifetime

cast a covetous eye on her properties, would that be enough

to justify a finding that her death had been an unnatural

death ? I do not think it would. The design may provide a

motive for murder; but the murder, that is, in this case an

unnatural death, cannot be proved by it. That design does

not exclude the possibility that Laxmibai died a natural

death and the appellant made full use of the opportunity

thereby provided to carry his design into effect.

I think I should mention here one other aspect of the case.

The trial Court observed that the symptoms found in the

record as to the last illness and death of Laxmibai all

clearly pointed to the conclusion that death was due to

hypoglycemia and that hypoglycemia might be one of the

possible causes of her death. The trial Court however held

that there was nothing to show in the symptoms that

hypoglycemia could have been of spontaneous origin though

the matter was not very clear. It would seem that the trial

Court thought that the hypoglycemia had been induced by two

injections of insulin given by the appellant to Laxmibai

sometime on November 12. The trial Court for this purpose

relied on the evidence of Shantabai a maid servant employed

by Laxmibai, who said that on November 12, the appellant

gave Laxmibai two injections. This maid servant was deaf

and dumb and her evidence must be of doubtful value.

However that may be, there is nothing to show that death was

caused by hypoglycemia brought about by the two injections

given by the appellant, assuming that he had given them. It

has to be remembered that in the hospital Laxmibai was given

two further injections of insulin of 40 units each. It may

be that these injections really caused her death. That is a

possibility which on the finding of the trial Court cannot

be brushed aside. Now, if that is so, then clearly the

appellant is not responsible for the death of Laxmibai. He

had done nothing to induce Dr. Anija or any of the other

doctors in the hospital to give more insulin to Laxmibai.

There is no evidence to that effect. Dr. Anija was clear in

her evidence that she never consulted Dr. Lagu regarding the

diagnosis that death was due to diabetic. I need not further

into this aspect of the

566

matter for all that I wish to point out is that the trial

Court had thought that hopoglycemia might be the cause of

death. The High Court, thought that it was not possible in

view of the absence of evidence about the time taken for

insulin to induce hypoglycemia to hold that death was due to

hypoglycemia induced by a massive dose of insulin. It seems

to me that if there was no evidence, that was the fault of

the prosecution and not of the appellant. In all cases and

particularly in a case of this kind, it is the duty of the

prosecution to prove that the death was an unnatural death

and exclude by evidence completely, the possibility of death

having been caused by some instrumentality other than the

appellant. This is another reason for saying that it has

not been clearly established in this case that Laxmibai's

death was an unnatural death or has been caused by the

appellant.

I have so long been discussing the facts which are supposed

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to lead towards the guilt of the appellant. I propose now

to deal with some of the facts which seem to be in his

favour. The prosecution case is that the appellant had in

the train administered to her an undetectable poison which

caused her death. Now, if the appellant had done that, he

must have made a plan for it before he started on the

journey to Bombay with her from Poona. It seems unlikely

that if he had done that, he would have made no effort to

keep it a secret that he was taking her to Bombay. The

evidence is clear that he made no such effort. The next

fact that has to be faced by the prosecution is that the

railway compartment would be a most unusualplace in which to

administer a poison. The appellant could not have expected

that there would be a compartment for Laxmibai and himself

in which there would be no other passenger. Indeed the

trial Court thought that there must have been other

passengers in that compartment. That being so, it becomes

improbable that the appellant had planned to poison her in

the train. Again, it has been proved as a fact by Dr. Sathe

himself that the appellant had made an appointment with him

for November 13. Was it necessary for him to have done this

if he knew that Laxmibai would die before the hour fixed

with Dr. Sathe ? Further, if he had administered

567

a poison to Laxmibai, would he have taken her to a. public

hospital? That would have been impossible unless the

appellant was perfectly certain that the poison was

absolutely undetectable. That requires a great deal of

knowledge of poisonous drugs which there is no evidence to

think the appellant possessed. But assume that the

appellant was so certain that the poison would never be

detected, why then should he have worried about the

postmortem examination at all? If it is found that the

appellant had not prevented the postmortem examination being

held, there would be very little on which to base his

conviction for the murder of Laxmibai by poisoning. Nor can

it be said that the appellant was not sure whether the

poison would be detected or not, but none the less took the

risk of taking the unconscious Laxmibai to the G. T.hospital

in the hope that if any difficulty arose, he could rely on

Dr. Mouskar to help him. There is no evidence on which we

can hold that Dr. Mouskar would have helped him if any

suspicion as to Laxmibai's death having been caused by

poision had arisen. It has to be remembered that Dr.

Mouskar was not doing the work of a physician in the

hospital but was in charge only of the administration. All

these are very strong circumstances indicating that the

appellant had not administered any poison to Laxmibai on the

train. Very cogent reasons would be required to dispel the

presumption in favour of the appellant arising from them. I

find no such reasons in the case.

In the net result the circumstances appear to me to be

these. First, the appellant had a design during Laxmibai's

lifetime to misappropriate her properties. This only

supplies the motive for causing her death but does not prove

that the death which occurred, was an unnatural death.

Secondly, the appellant did not give to the hospital the

correct name of Laxmibai : the name given however was not

such as from it her identity could never have been

discovered. Thirdly, the appellant gave his own address

instead of that of Laxinibai. It seems to me that that was

a natural thing for him to have done in the circumstances of

the case for there would have been no one in Laxmibai's flat

to receive her letters and there there was no other address

which the appellant could have

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568

given. Further, the address given necessarily connected the

appellant with the last hours of Laxmibai'slife-a conduct

not very probable in a person who had brought about her

death. The theory that that address was given only to

ensure that communications from the hospital concerning the

dead Laxmibai should reach the appellant is not very

plausible. It is clear that if the appellant had not given

his own address, the only other address he could possibly

have given would have been Laxmibai's address. I am unable

to appreciate what communication the hospital could have

sent to Laxmibai at her address after her death or when she

lay in the hospital. In any event, the appellant would have

had no difficulty in getting hold of any such communication

sent to Laxmibai's own address. Fourthly, the appellant

told Dr. Ugale that Laxmibai had had a hysterical fit. It

is doubtful whether he said so, and also whether, if he did,

it was purposefully false. What purpose it served is not

clear. The appellant did not mention hysterical fit to the

doctor in charge of the treatment nor did he do anything to

induce her to take a different line of treatment from that

which she had adopted. He did nothing to induce any idea in

her mind as to the cause of the illness or the disease. In

these circumstances it does not seem possible to hold that

hysterical fit had been mentioned by the appellant to

prevent detection of the fact that Laxmibai had been

poisoned. Lastly, come the series of the appellant's acts

from immediately after Laxmibai's death indicating his

intention to acquire her properties and the acquisition

thereof by deception and forgery. These cannot prove that

Laxmibai died an unnatural death. Considering them all

together, I am unable to think that the only reasonable

conclusion possible is that Laxmibai died an unnatural

death.

In my view the prosecution has failed to prove the guilt of

the appellant.

In the result I would allow the appeal.

BY COURT. In accordance with the opinion of the majority,

the appeal is dismissed.

Appeal dismissed.

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