Budgam, May 17: Bringing to a close a legal battle spanning over a decade, the Supreme Court of India on Wednesday dismissed a criminal appeal filed by the erstwhile State of Jammu and Kashmir, affirming the acquittal of Gulzar Ahmad Bhat alias Peer and three others in an alleged rape case that had its origins in a 2013 First Information Report (FIR) lodged at Police Station Khansahib in Budgam. The judgment was delivered by a Bench comprising Justice BV Nagarathna and Justice Satish Chandra Sharma.
The appeal arose out of the State’s challenge to concurrent verdicts by the Sessions Court and the Jammu and Kashmir High Court, both of which had cleared the accused of serious charges under Sections 376 (rape) and 109 (abetment) of the now-defunct Ranbir Penal Code (RPC), which governed criminal law in Jammu and Kashmir before the abrogation of Article 370.
The Sessions Court of Budgam, in its judgment dated February 12, 2015, in Sessions Case No. 142/S, acquitted respondents Nos 1, 3, 5, and 6, citing insufficient evidence to sustain the charges. The State’s appeal to the High Court was dismissed by a Division Bench on February 23, 2017, which found no infirmity in the trial court’s reasoning. Dissatisfied, the State escalated the matter to the apex court, where it was argued as Criminal Appeal No 1682 of 2017.
During the hearing, which took place in Court No 7 of the Supreme Court, Jammu and Kashmir was represented by advocates Parth Awasthi and Pradeep Baisoya, under the instructions of Advocate-on-Record (AOR) Pashupathi Nath Razdan. The State submitted that prosecution witnesses (PWs) 1 to 5 had provided consistent testimony establishing the culpability of the accused. The counsel argued that both the trial and High Courts had failed to give due weight to this evidence and had thereby committed a miscarriage of justice.
However, the respondents’ side, led by senior advocate S Nagamuthu and assisted by advocate Anupam Raina, with support from Shreyas Kaushal and Ankur Parihar, maintained that there were no inconsistencies in the lower court judgments that could justify the intervention of the Supreme Court. Nagamuthu strongly emphasised the high bar for appellate interference in acquittal cases, pointing out that the accused enjoy a “double presumption of innocence”, first as individuals on trial and second as persons acquitted by a court of law.
“The appellant-State has not been able to point out categorically any contradictions or lapses in the evidence or the judgments passed by the courts below,” the Bench observed in its written order. The justices made it clear that the prosecution had failed to highlight any material infirmities or legal errors in the concurrent findings of fact.
Justice Nagarathna, writing for the Bench, reiterated the judiciary’s established approach in such matters, noting, “We have closely perused the impugned judgment of the High Court, which has affirmed the judgment of acquittal passed by the Sessions Court. We do not find any reason to interfere with the impugned judgment. Hence, we dismiss this appeal.”
In bolstering its reasoning, the Court relied on prior Supreme Court precedents, notably Yashwant and Others vs. State of Maharashtra [(2019) 18 SCC 571] and Rajesh Prasad vs. The State of Bihar and Another [(2022) 3 SCR 1046]. Both of these cases underscore the principle that appellate courts must tread cautiously while disturbing acquittals unless the conclusions reached are palpably unreasonable or perverse.
In a concise conclusion to the prolonged litigation, the Bench remarked: “The appellant-State has failed to make out a case for interference. There is no merit in this appeal.”
The judgment reiterates the foundational principle of Indian criminal jurisprudence, that an accused person is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, and that acquittals, once rendered, are not to be overturned lightly.
