When Habil Sindhu, a poor farmer in Odisha’s Mayurbhanj district, was arrested for three gruesome murders near his house in 2003, his co-villagers and relatives shunned his family. Among the dead was a two-year-old boy.
When a trial court convicted Sindhu and sentenced him to life imprisonment two years later, villagers scornfully called his family the “murderer’s family”. The poor tribal man spent 18 years in jail before he was acquitted.
Sindhu, 48, was all smiles when he came out of jail on December 16. He was acquitted by Mayurbhanj district and sessions judge Pradeep Kumar Patnaik, who presided over a retrial of the case as ordered by the Orissa High Court, for want of evidence.
“I am very happy today. I spent nearly twenty years in prison. I had given up hope that I would be found innocent. These years were very difficult,” said Sindhu, an illiterate man from the primitive tribe of Kohl, soon after he learnt of his acquittal. “My family used to come to see me in jail, but I had asked them to stop coming. I have my wife, a son and a daughter, and grandchildren. There is some land. I will return home and cultivate that land,” he said.
According to the prosecution, Sindhu had brutally murdered two young men and a baby, who were his neighbours, on January 1, 2003 in course of his practice of witchcraft. The triple murder, which took place near Sindhu’s village of Kudugutu, had created a sensation at the time.
The bodies of Jamadar Pingua, his father-in-law Tunaram Purty and Jamadar’s two-year-old son Sukru Pingua – were found beheaded. Their genitals were also chopped off. The three mutilated bodies were found on the banks of the river Khairi near the village on January 2.
Habil Sindhu was arrested the next day after the police home guard in the village, Kanhei Pingua, informed the officers at Jashipur police station that Sindhu had confessed to killing the three persons.
A trial of the case based on the investigations conducted by officer-in-charge Rasanand Raut led to Sindhu’s conviction in 2005. Additional district and sessions judge JK Das, who heard the case, sentenced Sindhu to life imprisonment.
Unable to afford a competent lawyer to defend him in the case, Sindhu had relied on a government lawyer. When he appealed against the conviction in the high court, the superior court observed that he was not properly defended in the case and that there were inconsistencies in the trial. The HC ordered that a retrial be conducted with an experienced and competent lawyer representing Sindhu.
“It is said that a hundred guilty people may go free, but no innocent person should be punished. I am very happy with the acquittal of Habil Sindhu and his release from jail. I defended him well enough and took no fees from him,” said Asit Kumar Otta, the senior lawyer who represented Sindhu.
He said the acquittal judgment came after a thorough examination of the police investigation and the case material. “The prosecution charged Habil Sindhu of triple murder, but when witnesses and evidences were examined, they failed to prove the circumstantial evidence and extrajudicial confession that had led to the conviction 15 years ago,” said Otta.
As many as 11 prosecution witnesses and 32 police documents related to the case were examined during the retrial.
“It is clear that the police, without conducting a proper investigation, had charged an innocent man with three murders. He (Sindhu) lost 18 precious years of his life behind the bars. We will soon approach the high court to ensure that he gets compensation for it as per the law,” added Otta.
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