Citation: Chandan Mahto & Anr. v. State of Bihar, Criminal Appeal (DB) No. 165 of 2023, Patna High Court (Justices Rajeev Ranjan Prasad and Sunil Dutta Mishra), decided on 01.10.2026 | CNR No. BRHC010128602023
The testimony of an injured eyewitness carries great weight and can be rejected only for inherent credibility problems. If the defence plans to challenge a witness’s presence, the lighting at the scene, or a police statement, it must put the point to the witness or the investigating officer in cross-examination, and a court will not assume such a fact on its own. Lapses in an investigation do not help the accused unless they create real doubt about the prosecution’s case, and testimony of mostly related defence witnesses on enmity or the victim’s character is not given much weight without independent proof.
The Patna High Court has upheld the life sentences of two men for the knife murder of a man in a land-dispute attack in Saran, Bihar, holding that the injured brother’s testimony was reliable and that the defence’s doubts about lighting and the witnesses’ presence were never put to the witnesses.
On 20 December 2018, around 5:30 pm, Chandan Mahto and Om Prakash Mahto allegedly came to Birendra Sah’s house, abused his family and, when he objected, stabbed him in the abdomen so badly that his intestines came out. His brother Rajendra Sah (the informant) ran to save him and was also stabbed. Birendra died at the hospital. The trial court convicted both men under Sections 302/34 IPC read with Section 3(2)(v) of the SC/ST Act and Section 307/34 IPC, and sentenced them to life imprisonment and ten years’ rigorous imprisonment, to run together. The accused argued that it was dark, that the parents were not real eyewitnesses and had even said the police never recorded their statements, that Rajendra’s injuries might be self-inflicted, and that the case was a false one arising from an old land quarrel. Justices Rajeev Ranjan Prasad and Sunil Dutta Mishra upheld the conviction. They treated the injured brother as the “star witness” whose testimony could not be thrown out without real credibility problems, and found that the defence had never suggested to him that he was absent or had hurt himself, nor that there was no light at the spot. The court accepted the mother as an eyewitness, because the investigating officer said he recorded her statement and the defence never confronted him with her denial, and it was likely that the illiterate elderly woman had misunderstood the questions three and a half years later. The court did not treat the father as an eyewitness, since he was milking a cow at the other end and could see only 2-3 steps, and he learned of the incident from his son. The court noted the investigating officer’s lapses, such as not recording the names of villagers, but the defence had not exposed contradictions in his evidence. It also found the defence witnesses mostly related to the accused, and the land dispute was only the reason for the attack, not a reason to doubt the prosecution. The appeal was dismissed.