Wife killed for burning non-veg, Bombay High Court commutes life sentence to 10 years

The Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court commuted the life sentence of a man to 10 years in prison. In 2015, he killed his wife. The only crime of the wife was that her meat curry was burnt.

The convict appealed against the trial court’s decision in the Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court. The verdict was pronounced on Tuesday by a bench of Justices Rohit Dev and Urmila Joshi-Phalke.

Read what the court said in the judgment…
‘Actually, the accused had not prepared to commit the attack. When he saw that his wife had not cooked the food, he abused her and assaulted her. The weapon used in this case is a deadly weapon, like a wooden one. The husband was aware that this would cause injury to the wife. The intention of the accused was also to hurt the wife. However, the accused did not take undue advantage of the situation and did not behave in a cruel or extraordinary manner.

The bench said – it cannot be called murder
The Bench said that what the husband had done would fall within Exception 4 of Section 300 of the Indian Penal Code, which deals with murder as culpable homicide. Its basis is that the incident happened suddenly and there was no prior planning for it.

In its order, the bench quoted renowned psychiatrist Sidney Brandon’s book Violence in the Family- ‘Statistics show that after dark it is safer to be with a stranger on the street than to be with family at home, because But there is a possibility of accidents, murder and violence.

Know what was the whole matter…
On September 4, 2015, the accused husband, in an inebriated state, killed his wife because the meat was not cooked properly and got burnt. This incident took place in front of the neighbors and the next morning the wife was found lying unconscious in her house. When he was taken to the hospital, the doctors declared him brought dead.

The police arrested the husband and recorded the statements of the neighbors and the daughter of the accused. During the trial, the daughter and 4 witnesses turned hostile. Despite this, the prosecution proved the guilt of the accused. The Sessions Court had sentenced the accused to life imprisonment for the murder of his wife, which has been converted into 10 years’ imprisonment by the High Court bench.