The Supreme Court has acquitted Sahab Singh alias Sat Pal, who had spent over 16 years and 7 months in incarceration, holding that the prosecution failed to establish his guilt beyond reasonable doubt in the 2007 murder and sexual assault case involving a six-year-old child.
A Bench of Justices Sanjay Kumar and Sanjeev Sachdeva allowed the appeal and set aside the judgments of the Trial Court and the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which had convicted and sentenced Sahab Singh to life imprisonment under Section 302 IPC, along with sentences under Sections 201 and 377 IPC.
The prosecution case was based entirely on circumstantial evidence and the “last seen together” theory. According to the prosecution, the accused had allegedly been seen with the deceased child before the child was found dead in a well.
The prosecution also relied upon an alleged extra-judicial confession made by the accused before the village Sarpanch, a disclosure statement and the recovery of articles including a packet of namkeen.
The child, Gaurav, went missing on March 11, 2007. His body was discovered in a village well the following morning. The post-mortem report attributed the cause of death to asphyxia resulting from smothering and cervical spinal injury.
The Supreme Court closely examined the evidence and concluded that the prosecution had failed to establish the necessary chain of circumstances.
The Court noted that the packet of namkeen recovered from the spot was a generic packet readily available in the village, and there was no evidence connecting that particular packet with the accused. It also noted that the alleged purchase of the namkeen by the accused surfaced only later, when the alleged extra-judicial confession was said to have been made.
The Court further pointed out discrepancies in the evidence of prosecution witnesses. One witness had stated that the accused was brought to his shop by the police on March 12, while the prosecution's case was that the accused made an extra-judicial confession only on March 14. The Supreme Court held that this was a crucial discrepancy, since the prosecution case itself depended substantially on the alleged “last seen” circumstance and confession.
The Court also found that another witness had not mentioned in his examination-in-chief that a child was accompanying the accused. The reference to the child came during cross-examination and was absent from his earlier statement to the police, leading the Court to observe that there appeared to be an improvement in the prosecution evidence.
The Supreme Court rejected reliance on the accused's disclosure statement under Section 27 of the Evidence Act.
The Court observed that no new fact or incriminating article was discovered pursuant to the disclosure statement. The alleged identification of the places of occurrence could not constitute a discovery because those places were already known to the police and a site plan had been prepared two days earlier.
The Court also highlighted a significant chronological error in the High Court's reasoning: the deceased's body had been recovered on March 12, 2007, whereas the alleged disclosure statement was recorded on March 14, 2007. Therefore, the disclosure statement could not have led to the discovery of the body.
The Supreme Court reiterated that an extra-judicial confession is a weak piece of evidence and cannot, by itself, ordinarily form the basis of conviction without independent and cogent corroboration.
The Court held that where such a confession suffers from material discrepancies or inherent improbabilities, the court would be justified in excluding it from consideration.
The Court also considered the forensic evidence. Although semen was detected on the accused's underwear and on the rectal swab of the deceased, no DNA examination was conducted to establish that the two samples belonged to the same person.
The Supreme Court held that in the absence of evidence establishing the connection, the prosecution could not shift the burden onto the accused to explain the presence of semen on his underwear.
The Bench ultimately held that the prosecution had failed to establish the connection between the accused and the victim, the presence of the victim in the accused's company at the relevant time, or even the accused's connection with the place of occurrence.
Finding “several missing links” in the chain of circumstances, the Court held that the prosecution had failed to prove the accused's guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
Consequently, the Supreme Court set aside the conviction and sentence imposed by the Sessions Court, Ambala, as well as the Punjab and Haryana High Court's judgment upholding the conviction. The Court extended the benefit of doubt to Sahab Singh alias Sat Pal and reaffirmed its direction that he be released forthwith, unless his continued incarceration was required in any other case.
Case: Sahab Singh alias Sat Pal v. State of Haryana
Citation: 2026 INSC 945
Judgment: September 2, 2026
Bench: Justice Sanjay Kumar and Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva.
Representation:-
For Petitioner(s) Mr. S. Mahendran, AOR
For Respondent(s) Mr. Justine George, A.A.G. Mr. Samar Vijay Singh, AOR Ms. Sabarni Som, Adv. Mr. Aman Dev Sharma, Adv. Ms. Anjali Upadhyay, Adv. Mr. Tushar Saigal, Adv. Mr. A.S.L.N. Raju, Adv.
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