BENGALURU: The High Court of Karnataka has sentenced five persons to life imprisonment for murdering AS Ramakrishna, who was the administrator of KVG Medical College at Sullia in Dakshina Kannada, a decade ago. The five accused are Dr Renuka Prasad, Manoj Rai, Nagesh HR, Vaman Poojary and Shankara from Dakshina Kannada and Hassan districts.
Ramakrishna was murdered while he was returning home after an evening walk on April 28, 2011, at Sullia. He was attacked with swords over the partition of properties between him and Dr Renuka Prasad.
A division bench of Justices Sreenivas Harish Kumar and G Basavaraja passed the order while setting aside the judgment of a court in Dakshina Kannada issued on October 21, 2016, acquitting the accused. The State Government filed an appeal in the HC against the acquittal order.
The court directed Dr Renuka Prasad, who owns many educational institutions in Sullia, to pay Rs 10 lakh to the kin of Ramakrishna. It can be stated that primary evidence made available with regard to the case leads to the ultimate conclusion that the prosecution has proved its case beyond reasonable doubt. The approach of the trial court just appears to be perfunctory. It appears that the trial court judge has just noticed that the witnesses have turned hostile and he has not considered the evidence given by police officers and the FSL’s report in the right perspective, the court observed.
It noted that it is a well-established principle that whenever witnesses turn hostile, the court must make all efforts to separate the chaff from the grain and examine as to what extent the evidence of the hostile witnesses can be acted upon. If all the witnesses turn hostile in entirety, the evidence of the investigating officer and other police personnel must be put to analysis or scrutiny. This will help find out whether from their evidence the accused can be held guilty. The casual approach leads to a miscarriage of justice, the court said.