Kolkata: Calcutta High Court on Tuesday acquitted two men convicted of the murder of a 16-year-old girl in East Midnapore while observing that ‘extrajudicial confession by a co-accused alone cannot be the basis for convicting a person’.Sk Rafijul alias Tutul and Ukil Ali alias Akil Ali were convicted on Jan 24 and 25, 2024, by a West Midnapore court. While Rafijul was serving his sentence, Ukil was on bail as it was later held that he was a minor at the time of the commission of the crime and should not have been booked under IPC sections.The case dates back to Oct 2014. The victim’s father lodged a complaint before Belda police station stating that his 16-year-old daughter was missing. On Oct 11, 2014, around 7 pm, the victim’s female friend, referred to in the judgment as ‘S’, called her out. She went missing thereafter.The victim’s parents were called by the cops from Pataspur Police Station on Oct 12, 2014, and asked to go to Belda Police Station. There, the victim’s father was informed that the girl’s body was found beside OT Road in Belda.The parents’ version was that ‘S’ confessed to them that she had handed over their daughter to her male friend, one of the convicts – Rafijul alias Sk Tutul – and Ukil Ali. They took her away in a car, which was allegedly driven by Bisu Ghorai. The victim’s parents further stated that ‘S’ also confessed that she did it out of revenge as the victim’s brother refused to get into a relationship with her.In the trial court, 28 witnesses were examined. The trial judge relied on the fact that the victim was last seen with the convicts and the alleged extrajudicial confession by ‘S’, who was tagged as a Child in Conflict with Law (CCL) as she was a minor.The division bench of Justice Arijit Banerjee and Justice Apurba Sinha Ray acquitted both as the two points relied on by the trial judge, ‘last seen theory’ and ‘extra judicial confession’, were held to have loopholes. The bench held that a confession made by an accused outside of court or to any person other than a Judicial Magistrate is historically viewed as a weak piece of evidence in Indian criminal jurisprudence, but at the same time, it can be said that if certain stringent conditions are fulfilled, such an extrajudicial confession can be used by the court with some supporting corroborative evidence.But in this case, the division bench opined that the confession, for which it needs to be established that it was made without any external pressure, was flawed. The victim’s female friend who allegedly “confessed” to the victim’s parents over a call was already under pressure from her father and a local panchayat member.
