Last seen theory cannot sustain conviction without a narrow time gap and corroborative evidence.

On May 26, 2016, at approximately 11:00 p.m., the Appellant and co-accused Subhash Kengar allegedly took the deceased, Suraj @ Bablu, from his residence on a motorcycle after calling him for a "program"

At 4:00 a.m. the following morning, the deceased was found in a pool of blood near Renuka Mata Temple with fatal head and chest injuries

The prosecution’s case rested on circumstantial evidence, primarily the "last seen together" theory deposed by the deceased's mother (PW1) and brother (PW2), and a watchman (PW3)

The Additional Sessions Judge, Pune, convicted the Appellant under Section 302 r/w 34 of the IPC on December 18, 2019, sentencing him to life imprisonment

The co-accused died during the pendency of the appeal, resulting in the abatement of his challenge

The Appellant challenged the conviction on the grounds that the chain of circumstances was incomplete

1. Whether the prosecution established a complete chain of circumstantial evidence, specifically the "last seen together" theory, to exclude every hypothesis of innocence

2. Whether the "last seen together" circumstance can form the sole basis of conviction in the absence of a narrow time gap and corroborative evidence such as motive or forensic links

The court applied Section 302 read with Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code regarding murder and common intention

It relied on the established principles of circumstantial evidence, which require that the facts established must be consistent only with the hypothesis of guilt and exclude all others

The court applied the "last seen together" doctrine, referencing Kanhaiyalal vs. State of Rajasthan, which holds that "last seen" does not necessarily lead to an inference of guilt without established connectivity to the crime

Furthermore, it cited Nazim & Ors. vs. The State of Uttarakhand and State of U.P. v. Satish to emphasize that a wide time gap between the "last seen" event and the discovery of the body allows for the possibility of third-party intervention, weakening the link

The court found the prosecution's chain of circumstances to be broken and inconclusive.

Although the "last seen" evidence of PW1 and PW2 established that the Appellant took the deceased at 11:00 p.m., the body was discovered four hours later, which the court deemed a wide enough gap to permit third-party intervention

The testimony of PW3, the watchman, was rejected as he admitted to identifying the accused only at the instance of the police, rendering him a "got-up" witness

Regarding motive, the court noted that the alleged prior quarrel from months ago was never reported to the police and lacked evidentiary support

Forensic evidence failed to connect the Appellant to the crime: the Chemical Analyser (CA) report regarding bloodstains on the Appellant’s clothes and the recovered stone was "inconclusive," and no fingerprints were found on the beer bottles at the scene

While Call Detail Records (CDR) proved the Appellant contacted the deceased, the court held this merely established a meeting but not the commission of murder

The "last seen" theory was found insufficient as a singular piece of evidence in the absence of a narrow time gap or forensic corroboration

Consequently, the High Court allowed the appeal, quashed the conviction and life sentence dated December 18, 2019, and acquitted the Appellant of all charges

The court ordered the Appellant's immediate release upon the execution of a PR Bond under Section 481 of the Bhartiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023