Lal Behari And Others vs The State

Neutral Citation No. - 2026:AHC-LKO:80149-DB
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
LUCKNOW
Reserved on 17.09.2026
Delivered on 05.11.2026
CRIMINAL REVISION No. - 375 of 1982
Lal Behari and others
…..Revisionist(s)
Versus
The State
…..Opposite Party(s)
Counsel for Revisionist(s) : S.n.bhattacharya, Abdul Salam
Counsel for Opposite Party(s) : Govt.advocate, S.b.srivastava
Court No. - 11
HON'BLE ABDUL MOIN, J.
HON'BLE PRAMOD KUMAR SRIVASTAVA, J.
1. Heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the record.
2. This Criminal Revision has been directed against the judgment
and order of acquittal dated 30.04.1982 passed by learned Sessions
Judge, Pratapgarh in Session Trial No. 204 of 1978: State Vs. Ram
Sahodar @ Rameshwar Prasad and others, whereby learned trial Court
has acquitted all the respondents-accused persons for the aforesaid
charge levelled against them.
3. The prosecution case in brief is that on 8.4.1977 at about 3:30 PM
accused were watering their field from Nali (channel), which flooded the

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filed of complainant’s Lal Behari and damaged their food grain. The
complainant made a complaint to accused Ram Sahodar and asked as to
why they had done so. Thereupon accused Ram Sahodar, Ram Murti and
Babban assaulted the complainant. Ram Sahodar was carrying ballam
while other accused persons were having lathis in their hands. The
complainant snatched the ballam from accused Ram Sahodar so that he
could defend himself himself. Sankhata, Shankar and Ram Bharose had
witnessed the incident.
4. First Information Report (herein after referred to as “FIR”) had
been lodged on the basis of written report. Investigating Officer (herein
after referred to as “IO”) visited the place of occurrence, prepared the
site plan and after collecting the evidence filed charge-sheet against the
accused persons Ram Sahodar alias Rameshwar Prasad, Jagjit, Samarjit,
Sankhata Prasad, Ram Murti and Shiva Kant under Sections 147, 148,
323 and 149 of I.P.C..
5. The trial Court framed the charges against the accused persons for
the aforesaid offences, who denied all the charges and claimed to be
tried.
6. The prosecution adduced the oral evidence of complainant Lal
Behari PW 1, Mata Prasad PW-2, Dr. D. P. Singh PW-3, Ganesh Prasad
Sharma PW-4 and IO Jaharul Haq PW-5.
7. From the statements, it emerged that the complainant Lal Behari
and eight other family members inflicted blows of lathi to the accused
persons. In the meantime, Kuldeep son of Rameshwar came forward to
save Rameshwar, then complainant Lal Behari inflicted ballam blow,
resulting which Kuldeep fell down and succumbed. According to
defence witness DW-1 the injuries to complainant and his injured family
members were caused by accused Ram Sahodar and others in the
exercise of right of private defence.
8. Learned trial Court after considering entire facts, evidences and
circumstances found that prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond

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CRLR No. - 375 of 1982
reasonable doubt and they were acquitted of the charges leveled against
them.
9. Being aggrieved and dissatisfied from the impugned judgment
dated 30.04.1982, the revisionists Lal Bihari and others have filed this
criminal revision on the ground that learned trial Court has erred in
considering entire facts, evidences and circumstances in correct
perspective. Despite of the fact that revisionists had sustained injuries,
yet the trial Court did not give finding with regard to aggressor and
caused failure of substantial justice. Learned trial Court had not
considered the gravity of the injuries, which were supported by the
medical report, but the trial Court failed to appreciate the medical
evidence as well as evidence of Investigating Officer.
10. On the above basis, it is contended that the impugned judgment
passed in Session Trial no. 204/78 under Sections 147, 148, 149, 323 of
the IPC in which the accused persons were acquitted is liable to be set
aside and the criminal revision is liable to be allowed and consequently,
accused respondents have liable to be convicted.
11. Learned A.G.A. submits that the trial Court has passed the
impugned judgment and order after considering the entire material
available on record, which is consonance with law and there is no
illegality or irregularity in the impugned judgment. The present criminal
revision is devoids of merit and is liable to be dismissed.
12. After arguing at some length, learned counsel appearing for the
revisionists submits that he is not intending to press the revision.
13. It is made clear that once the criminal revision has been filed, it
cannot be not pressed nor it can be dismissed on default. It can be
decided on merits only, therefore, we are considering the material
available on record.
14. Before entering into the merits of the case, it is expedient to
mention the relevant case laws by Hon’ble Supreme Court.
15. In the case of Akalu Ahir Vs. Ramdeo Ram (AIR 1973 SC
2145), Hon’ble Apex Court has held that “this Court, however, by way

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CRLR No. - 375 of 1982
of illustration, indicated the following categories of cases which would
justify the High Court in interfering with a finding of acquittal in
revision:
i. Where the trial court has no jurisdiction to try the case, but has
still acquitted the accused;
ii. Where the trial court has wrongly shut out evidence which the
prosecution wished to produce;
iii. Where the appellate court has wrongly held the evidence
which was admitted by the trial court to be inadmissible;
iv. Where the material evidence has been overlooked only (either)
by the trial court or by the appellate court; and v. Where the
acquittal is based on the compounding of the offence which is
invalid under the law.
These categories were, however, merely illustrative and it was
clarified that other cases of similar nature can also be properly
held to be of exceptional nature where the High Court can
justifiably interfere with the order of acquittal.”
16. The observations in the case of Vimal Singh Vs. Khuman Singh
1998 SC 3380 would also be apt for recapitulation and, therefore, are
being extracted below:
"9. Coming to the ambit of power of the High Court under Section
401 of the Code, the High Court in its revisional power does not
ordinarily interfere with judgments of acquittal passed by the trial
court unless there has been manifest error of law or procedure. The
interference with the order of acquittal passed by the trial court is
limited only to exceptional cases when it is found that the order under
revision suffers from glaring illegality or has caused miscarriage of
justice or when it is found that the trial court has no jurisdiction to
try the case or where the trial court has illegally shut out the
evidence which otherwise ought to have been considered or where the
material evidence which clinches the issue has been overlooked.
These are the instances where the High Court would be justified in
interfering with the order of acquittal. Sub-section (3) of Section 401
mandates that the High Court shall not convert a finding of acquittal

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CRLR No. - 375 of 1982
into one of conviction. Thus, the High Court would not be justified in
substituting an order of acquittal into one of conviction even if it is
convinced that the accused deserves conviction. No doubt, the High
Court in exercise of its revisional power can set aside an order of
acquittal if it comes within the ambit of exceptional cases enumerated
above, but it cannot convert an order of acquittal into an order of
conviction. The only course left to the High Court in such exceptional
cases is to order retrial."
17. The apex court in the case of Venkatesan v. Rani reported in AIR
2013 SC 3320 while discussing the true contours of the jurisdiction vested in
High Court’s under section 397 read with section 401 of Code of Criminal
Procedure, 1973 discussed the observations made in the case of Akalu Ahir
(supra) and Vimal Singh (supra) and observed as under:
“7. The above consideration would go to show that the
revisional jurisdiction of the High Courts while examining an
order of acquittal is extremely narrow and ought to be
exercised only in cases where the trial court had committed a
manifest error of law or procedure or had overlooked and
ignored relevant and material evidence thereby causing
miscarriage of justice. The reappreciation of evidence is an
exercise that the High Court must refrain from while
examining an order of acquittal in the exercise of its
revisional jurisdiction under the Code. Needless to say, if
within the limited parameters, interference of the High Court
is justified the only course of action that can be adopted is to
order a retrial after setting aside the acquittal. As the
language of Section 401 of the Code makes it amply clear
there is no power vested in the High Court to convert a
finding of acquittal into one of conviction.”
18. Thus from the above, it is clear that revisional jurisdiction of the
High Court under Section 401 of the CrPC is not very wide. The
interference with the order of acquittal passed by the trial Court is
limited only in exceptional cases when it is found that the order under
revision suffers from patent illegality or has caused miscarriage of
justice and passed without jurisdiction.

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CRLR No. - 375 of 1982
19. In the instant case, on the perusal of material available on the
record, it transpires that the learned trial Court has considered the
evidence adduced in the matter and after close scrutiny of the facts and
evidences, findings have been given.
20. Learned trial Court also observed that injuries sustained by
Kuldeep were not satisfactorily explained and the theory of “chheena-
jhapti” was found unbelievable. The learned trial Court also found that
the statement of the complainant Lal Behari and injured Mata Prasad is
not clinching and convincing. Although no specific finding has been
given with regard to aggressor and exercising of the right of private
defence, but from the analysis of the findings, it infers that since
prosecution has failed to prove it’s case beyond reasonable doubt,
consequently, learned trial Court acquitted the accused-respondents.
21. We find no illegality or patent irregularity in the exercise of
jurisdiction by the learned trial Court; consequently, this criminal
revision is devoid of merit and is liable to be dismissed.
22. Accordingly, dismissed.
(Pramod Kumar Srivastava,J.) (Abdul Moin,J.)
November 05, 2026
Arvind
Digitally signed by :-
ARVIND KUMAR SRIVASTAVA
High Court of Judicature at Allahabad,
Lucknow Bench