In Brief
A man was convicted of murdering his wife by pouring kerosene and setting her on fire under Section 302 IPC, based primarily on a dying declaration made before a magistrate. However, the Supreme Court found that the wife's dying declaration contradicted her two earlier statements (made to a doctor and police on the day of the incident) in which she said the fire was accidental. The Court observed that no corroborative physical evidence supported the dying declaration: the alleged kerosene smell was absent when examined by doctors, hostile witnesses did not support the recovery of kerosene cans, and family tensions suggested potential motives for false testimony. Accordingly, the Court held that reliance on the dying declaration alone was unsafe and acquitted the appellant.
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