CHENNAI: Eight years after a trial court acquitted 23 people accused of murdering a man due to election rivalry in Villupuram in 2013, the Madras high court on Tuesday reversed the order and sentenced 21 of them to life imprisonment.“On a careful re-appreciation of the entire evidence on record, we find that the prosecution proved its case beyond all reasonable doubt and also proved the presence of the accused as members of an unlawful assembly and also the existence of a common object to cause the death of the deceased,” a division bench of Justice P Velmurugan and Justice M Jothiraman said.“The evidence of eyewitnesses is cogent, consistent and inspires the confidence of the court, and stands corroborated by other material evidence. The trial court discarded reliable evidence wholly on untenable grounds, placing undue emphasis on minor discrepancies and trivial contradictions, which do not go to the root of the prosecution case. Such an approach amounts to a clear misappreciation of evidence and renders the acquittal perverse,” the bench added.According to the prosecution, prior enmity existed between Baskar and Krishnaveni in connection with the Kiliyanur panchayat election. On May 29, 2013, Baskar conducted a function at the local Mariamman temple. After he returned home with his wife, Amudha, around 12.30am on May 30, 2013, Krishnaveni, along with the other named accused, allegedly assembled in front of his house armed with deadly weapons to murder him.When Baskar tried to escape, he was chased by the gang and was murdered with deadly weapons. Concluding the trial, on April 28, 2017, the trial court acquitted all the 23 accused people: Krishnaveni, Madhanraj, Madhankumar, Kathamuthu, Parthiban, Rani, Moorthy alias Krishnamoorthy, Marimuthu, Suresh, Jayaraj, Kumar, Murali, Dass alias Sivaprakasam, Janarthanan, Sivakumar, Jeyasekar, Veeramani, Velu, Jayagandhan, Vinoth alias Vinothkumar, Karunanidhi, Gnanasekaran, and Ramadas.Aggrieved, Baskar’s wife moved an appeal before the high court. Allowing the appeal, the bench found Krishnaveni, Madhanraj, Madhankumar, Kathamuthu, Parthiban, Rani, Moorthy alias Krishnamoorthy, Marimuthu, Suresh, Jayaraj, Murali, Dass alias Sivaprakasam, Janarthanan, Sivakumar, Jeyasekar, Veeramani, Jayagandhan, Vinoth alias Vinothkumar, Karunanidhi, Gnanasekaran and Ramadas guilty of the murder and sentenced them to life imprisonment.
