A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court on Thursday acquitted a woman who allegedly murdered her nine-year-old child due to marital discord.
The Bench comprising Justice K. Vinod Chandran and Justice C. Jayachandran, while setting aside the Ernakulam Additional District and Sessions court’s verdict sentencing her to life imprisonment, observed that “when a woman killed her progeny there was more than that meets the eye; which sensitivity, often, investigators lacked”.
Quoting Rudyard Kipling that “God could not be everywhere and therefore he made mothers”, the Bench said quiet paradoxical and tragic was the story projected in the case. The court made the observations while allowing an appeal filed by Teena of Angamaly, challenging the order of the sessions court.
The prosecution charge against the accused was that in order to wreak vengeance on her husband due to marital discord, the accused killed her son and attempted suicide in 2016.
Acquitting the woman, the judges observed that "we were unable to sustain the conviction found by the trial court, which is based on mere surmises and conjectures". The Bench opined it would be unfair to attribute motive for murder and suicide solely for the reason that she was vengeful.
The court added that the sessions judge had erred in marshalling of facts and scrutiny of evidence. The trial court also failed to consider the existence of a reasonable hypothesis of innocence of the accused. “We give the accused the benefit of doubt and acquit her”.
