In Brief
A man was convicted of murdering his wife by setting her on fire, based on dying declarations and oral statements. The Supreme Court acquitted him, finding that the written dying declarations had serious procedural defects and were unreliable. The oral statements by the deceased to her father and a family friend contradicted the written versions regarding what caused the incident (dowry demands vs. illicit relationship). The Court held that once the written declarations were rejected, the contradictory oral statements of interested witnesses could not form the basis for conviction, especially without trustworthy corroborative evidence. The appellant was entitled to the benefit of doubt and was acquitted.
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