P&H High Court Upholds Acquittal In Son's Murder Case, Disbelieves Theory That Poison Was Administered In Milk Without Deceased Detecting Smell
The Punjab and Haryana High Court has upheld the acquittal of a man, his brother and his brother's wife in a case where a mother had alleged that they conspired to poison and kill her 22-year-old son by administering Aluminium Phosphide mixed in milk. [2026 LiveLaw (PH) 236].It held that the compound's strong, pungent smell made it "incomprehensible" that it could have been administered...
The Punjab and Haryana High Court has upheld the acquittal of a man, his brother and his brother's wife in a case where a mother had alleged that they conspired to poison and kill her 22-year-old son by administering Aluminium Phosphide mixed in milk. [2026 LiveLaw (PH) 236].
It held that the compound's strong, pungent smell made it "incomprehensible" that it could have been administered without detection, and that the case suffered from an unexplained five-year delay in lodging the complaint besides a complete absence of corroborative evidence.
A Division Bench of Justice Vinod S. Bhardwaj and Justice Sukhvinder Kaur said, "Aluminium Phosphide is an inorganic solid compound used as a fumigant/insecticide/rodenticide. It reacts with moisture to emit lethal phosphine gas having a fishy/garlic like odor. It is thus incomprehensible that such a foul smell emitting compound could be administered undetected or by mixing the same in milk."
The Court was hearing an appeal filed by the State of Punjab against the judgment passed by the Additional Sessions Judge, Ludhiana, in 2005 acquitting respondents Mohinder Singh, Bhupinder Singh and Harjinder Kaur of charges under Sections 302, 34 and 120 (read with 120-B) of the Indian Penal Code, 1860.
As per the complaint filed by Surjit Kaur, her husband had developed illicit relations with wife of his brother a relationship her son, Harpreet Singh, objected to, causing friction with the accused.
In 1997, Harpreet Singh went to call his father from Harjinder Kaur's house and returned saying his father would not be back that night. He then lay down, began vomiting, and on being questioned, told his mother that lady (his father's alleged paramour had given him milk. As his condition worsened, Mohinder Singh, Bhupinder Singh and Bhupinder's son Chaman Pal Singh took Harpreet Singh to Jagraon — without the complainant, where he died the same night.
The complainant alleged that despite a post-mortem being conducted, the police took no action, citing the pendency of the chemical examiner's report, and that her subsequent efforts to have a case registered, including approaching higher authorities, went unheeded.
The complaint eventually reached the Illaqa Magistrate only in 2002, five years after the incident, and the case was thereafter committed to the Sessions Court, Ludhiana. The prosecution examined six witnesses, but the trial Court, on appraisal of the evidence, acquitted all three accused, prompting the State's appeal.
State counsel argued that the trial Court erred in acquitting the respondents despite the prosecution's specific case that Aluminium Phosphide had been mixed into the deceased's milk. It was submitted that Dr. Hari Krishan Singla was never specifically questioned about the smell of the substance, and therefore it could not be presumed that its administration would necessarily have been detected.
It was further argued that the trial Court failed to appreciate the complainant's consistent testimony, both in examination-in-chief and cross-examination, that her son had disclosed Harjinder Kaur had given him the milk.
Counsel for the respondents-accused submitted that the trial Court had rightly taken into account the chemical properties of Aluminium Phosphidea substance with a pungent smell that is easily detected, in disbelieving the prosecution's version, and that the State had failed to produce any medical or toxicological evidence to counter this finding.
It was further argued that, apart from the complainant's own self-serving testimony, no other evidence connected the respondents to the alleged offe
The Court noted at the outset that it remained undisputed that the cause of death, per the postmortem report and the Chemical Examiner's opinion, was Aluminium Phosphide, but found several fatal infirmities in the prosecution's case.
On the delay in lodging the complaint: The Court traced the timeline in detail, an initial complaint dated 10.04.1997 to the SSP, Ludhiana, marked to the SHO, Sadar, Jagraon, resulted in a report dated 23.04.1997 finding the allegations unproved, against which no protest was ever filed
Thereafter, no remedy was pursued for nearly four years, until an application said to be dated 01.08.2001 — which, the Court noted, had never actually been received by the SSP's office — surfaced only through the Punjab State Human Rights Commission, which itself declined to inquire into it as time-barred. The complaint was ultimately filed before the Illaqa Magistrate only in 2002, five years after the occurrence, with no explanation offered for this delay.
Affirming the trial Court's finding, the Bench held that Aluminium Phosphide's strong, pungent smell made it implausible that it could have been administered in milk without detection, and noted that the State had failed to produce any forensic or toxicological material to dislodge this finding.
The Court observed that the entire prosecution case rested on the complainant's sole testimony, uncorroborated by any other witness. It noted contradictions in her own account, including her claim that Gurmukh Singh was present when her son disclosed he had consumed the milk at Harjinder Kaur's house, a fact absent from both the original complaint and her list of witnesses and that other named witnesses, including Mohinder Pal Singh and Parminder Singh, were never examined.
On the internal inconsistencies of the prosecution version: The Court found it significant that the complainant and the accused shared a common courtyard, yet her account of sending her son to call his father, rather than doing so herself, did not hold up, particularly since she had admitted in cross-examination that Mohinder Singh had been living separately at his brother's house for over two months and was not on speaking terms with her or her son.
The Court held it telling that Harpreet Singh was taken to hospital by Mohinder Singh, Bhupinder Singh and Chaman Pal themselves none of whom were examined by the complainant, with no explanation offered for the omission reasoning that there would have been no occasion for Mohinder Singh to take the deceased for treatment had he conspired to kill him. '
It also found it inherently improbable that Bhupinder Singh, husband of Harjinder Kaur, would conspire to eliminate the very person objecting to his wife's alleged illicit relationship, observing that ordinarily a husband would act against the person suspected of the affair, not assist in removing someone opposing it
Reiterating the settled principle that an appellate Court will not substitute its own view for that of the trial Court where the acquittal is based on a possible and reasonable appreciation of the evidence, the Bench held that the State had failed to point out any infirmity, illegality or perversity in the trial Court's findings. The appeal was accordingly dismissed, and the judgment of acquittal dated 13.01.2005 passed by the Additional Sessions Judge, Ludhiana, was affirmed.
Title: State of Punjab v. Mohinder Singh and others
Mr. Bhanu Pratap Singh, Addl. A.G. Punjab
Mr. Arvinder Singh, Advocate for Mr. V.K. Shukla, Advocate, for the respondents.