Delhi HC Converts Murder Conviction To Culpable Homicide In Liquor Dispute Killing Between Friends [Read Judgment]

New Delhi: A Division Bench of Justice Prathiba M. Singh and Justice Madhu Jain, finding that the killing arose from a sudden quarrel over payment for liquor between two intoxicated close friends, that no weapon was brought to the scene, that the brick used was picked up from the vicinity on impulse, and that the deceased’s act of slapping the accused constituted grave and sudden provocation, altered the conviction from Section 302 IPC (murder) to Section 304 Part II IPC (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) and reduced the sentence from rigorous imprisonment for life to rigorous imprisonment of eight years.

The Delhi High Court on May 20, 2026, partly allowed the criminal appeal filed by Sanjay Singh challenging his conviction and life sentence for the murder of his close friend Amit, recorded by the Additional Sessions Judge, West District, Tis Hazari Courts, Delhi, by judgment dated September 30, 2024, and order on sentence dated January 4, 2025. While affirming the appellant’s responsibility for the death of the deceased, established beyond reasonable doubt by forensic, medical, and circumstantial evidence, the bench held that the totality of circumstances placed the case within Section 304 Part II IPC rather than Section 302 IPC, and accordingly modified the sentence to eight years of rigorous imprisonment. The fine of Rs. 50,000/-, including the compensation and prosecution expense components directed by the Trial Court, was left undisturbed.

On February 29, 2020, at approximately 8:00 AM, the appellant Sanjay Singh, a gardener by profession, went to the house of the deceased Amit, a labourer, and took him to his tenanted room at Khasra No. 37/19, near Shani Mandir, Bakkarwala, Baprola Road, Delhi, for the purpose of consuming liquor together. Both men were close friends of long standing who regularly drank together. At approximately 11:30 AM, an altercation broke out between them over the payment for the liquor that had been purchased. When the appellant asked the deceased to pay his share, the deceased refused. The deceased then slapped the appellant. In a state of sudden rage and intoxication, the appellant picked up a brick from outside the room and repeatedly struck the deceased on the head with it, causing fatal injuries. The post-mortem conducted on March 1, 2020, by Dr. Anurag Thapar at Indira Gandhi Hospital, Dwarka, recorded the cause of death as the combined effect of asphyxia resulting from manual strangulation and cranio-cerebral damage from blunt force impact on the head.

At approximately noon on the day of the incident, the appellant went to the residence of his landlord, Jai Bhagwan (PW-4), in a perplexed condition and made an extra-judicial confession, disclosing that he had killed someone in a quarrel at the plot. PW-4 accompanied the appellant back to the room, which the appellant himself unlocked, and found the deceased lying in a pool of blood with a blood-stained brick lying near the body. The police were called and the appellant was apprehended at the scene by Investigating Officer Inspector Bishamber Dayal (PW-20).

The prosecution led forensic evidence through two FSL witnesses. PW-18, Ms. Manisha Upadhyay, Assistant Director, Biology, FSL Delhi, deposed that the DNA profile generated from the blood-stained gauze attributed to the deceased (Ex. 10) matched the DNA profiles from the brick recovered from the scene (Ex. 1), the bed-sheet (Ex. 2), the blood-stained gauze from the place of occurrence (Ex. 3), and the appellant’s own clothes, one shirt and one pair of pyjamas/lower garments (Ex. 6). PW-19, Dr. Kapil Dev Mudgal, Senior Scientific Officer, Chemistry, FSL Delhi, deposed that examination of the viscera exhibits revealed the presence of ethyl alcohol in the deceased’s blood at 20.6 mg/100 ml. PW-4 additionally confirmed in cross-examination that the appellant too appeared to be under the influence of liquor at the relevant time. The state of intoxication of both parties was accordingly treated as a proved and undisputed circumstance by the High Court.

In his statement under Section 313 CrPC, the appellant denied all allegations, claimed false implication, and stated that he had left for work at 6:15 AM on a cycle as a plant-seller, and that on his return at noon, the police were already present and the body was found inside his room. He also suggested that PW-4 had a motive to falsely implicate him on account of unpaid rent of Rs. 2,800/- for two months. Before the High Court, counsel for the appellant challenged the reliability of the extra-judicial confession on the basis of inconsistencies in the DD entries (DD No. 26A and DD No. 50B), alleged delay in FIR registration (incident at 11:30 AM, FIR at 9:45 PM), the delayed seizure of the appellant’s clothes, the non-production of the appellant’s MLC, and the absence of evidence of proper Malkhana deposit of the seized clothes.

The Trial Court had convicted the appellant under Section 302 IPC based on three interlocking circumstances: the last-seen theory, the extra-judicial confession before PW-4, and the complete chain of circumstantial evidence including the DNA match, the weapon recovery, and the absence of any credible explanation. The life sentence was imposed with the direction that Rs. 9,000/- from the fine be paid to the prosecution as trial expenses and Rs. 41,000/- as compensation to the deceased’s family, with a further recommendation to the District Legal Services Authority, West District, for additional compensation under Section 357A(3) CrPC.

The High Court affirmed the appellant’s connection to the death without reservation. The DNA evidence, the extra-judicial confession, the last-seen circumstance, and the discovery of the deceased in the appellant’s locked room together constituted, in the bench’s assessment, an unbroken chain establishing the appellant’s culpability beyond reasonable doubt. The challenge to PW-4’s credibility on account of the Rs. 2,800/- unpaid rent was rejected as wholly without substance given PW-4’s status as an independent government employee whose testimony remained materially unshaken in cross-examination.

The bench, however, found that the Trial Court had not accorded sufficient weight to the surrounding circumstances when characterising the nature of the offence. The pivotal question, as the bench framed it, was not whether the appellant caused the death of the deceased, which was established, but whether he did so with the intention required for murder under Section 300 IPC, or merely with the knowledge that the act was likely to cause death, which falls within Section 304 Part II IPC. The bench laid out five circumstances that collectively compelled the downgrade:

First, the two men were close friends with no prior enmity; the quarrel arose spontaneously over something as trivial as payment for a shared bottle of liquor.

Second, the deceased slapped the appellant immediately before the assault, constituting grave and sudden provocation within the meaning of Exception 1 to Section 300 of the IPC; the provocation was immediate and the response instantaneous, with no time for passion to cool.

Third, neither party brought a weapon to the scene; the brick was lying on the katcha plot outside the room and was picked up at the spur of the moment, negating any inference of premeditation.

Fourth, both the appellant and the deceased were in a state of intoxication at the time of the incident, a proved circumstance confirmed by both the FSL report and PW-4’s own testimony.

Fifth, there was no evidence that the appellant had acted in a cruel or unusual manner pursuant to any pre-planned design; the assault, though serious in its consequences, was the result of an instantaneous loss of self-control.

The bench placed reliance on the Supreme Court’s decision in Sudam Prabhakar Achat v. State of Maharashtra, in which the Supreme Court held that where an assault occurs suddenly without premeditation and the parties bore no prior enmity, it would be inappropriate to attribute the gravest criminal intention to the accused, particularly where the weapons used were items readily available in the vicinity rather than weapons brought to the scene.

“The two men were friends. They were drinking together. The quarrel arose without warning over something as trivial as payment for a bottle of liquor. The deceased slapped the Appellant. The Appellant, in a state of intoxication and sudden rage, picked up a brick that was lying outside and struck the deceased. There was no prior plan. The Appellant was not carrying any weapon. There was no motive to kill. There was no intention, in the legal sense of the term, to cause death, but there was knowledge that striking a person repeatedly on the head with a brick is likely to cause death.”

~ Justice Madhu Jain (for the Division Bench), Delhi High Court (20.05.2026)

At the time of the High Court’s decision on May 20, 2026, the appellant had already served five years, six months, and twenty-one days of incarceration, as reflected in the nominal roll placed on record. Having altered the conviction to Section 304 Part II IPC, the bench modified the sentence of rigorous imprisonment for life to rigorous imprisonment for eight years. The fine of Rs. 50,000/-, the Rs. 9,000/- directed to be paid to the prosecution as trial expenses, and the Rs. 41,000/- directed to be paid as compensation to the family of the deceased, along with the DLSA recommendation for additional compensation, were all left undisturbed. The bench directed that a copy of the order be communicated to the concerned Jail Superintendent for necessary compliance.

CASE REFERENCE:

Matter: Sanjay Singh v. State (NCT of Delhi)
Case No.: CRL.A. 622/2025 & CRL.M.(BAIL) 1000/2025
Court: High Court of Delhi at New Delhi
Bench: Justice Prathiba M. Singh & Justice Madhu Jain
Date of Decision: May 20, 2026 (Reserved: May 7, 2026)
FIR: No. 75/2020, PS Mundka, Delhi (February 29, 2020)
For Appellant: Ms. Aishwarya Rao & Ms. Mansi Rao, Advocates
For State: Mr. Ritesh Kumar Bahri, APP; Ms. Divya Yadav & Mr. Lalit Luthra, Advocates
Precedent relied on: Sudam Prabhakar Achat v. State of Maharashtra, 2025 SCC OnLine SC 602

[Read Judgment]