No celebration, just relief: Centenarian's kin open up on 40 years of fighting murder accused tag

Hamirpur (UP), Feb 5 (PTI) There is no celebration, but a quiet relief for the kin of the nearly 100-year-old Dhani Ram, whose four-decades-long wait for exoneration in a murder case ended recently with the Allahabad High Court acquitting him of the charge.

The stain of being a murder accused and the protracted legal battle had shaped not just his life, but that of his entire family as well.

His youngest son, Lallu Ram, the present Bhulsi village head, said his father now suffers from transient memory loss.

"He may forget daily things, but he always remembers that there was a case against him. When we told him that the court had cleared him of the charge, he was genuinely happy," he told PTI.

The murder happened in 1982 over a land dispute, and three persons -- Maiku, Satti Din, and Dhani Ram were the accused in the case. While Maiku had absconded, the Hamirpur sessions court sentenced Satti Din and Ram to life imprisonment in 1984.

Ram was released on bail the same year. Satti Din passed away during the pendency of his appeal, leaving Ram as the sole surviving appellant in the case.

A division bench of Justices Chandra Dhari Singh and Justice Sanjiv Kumar acquitted the nearly 100-year-old man, noting that more than four decades have passed since he challenged his life term sentence and observing that social consequences suffered by him cannot be ignored for granting the relief.

The family said the case cast a long social shadow over their lives.

"People avoided us. Even getting our children married became difficult because no one wanted to marry the sons of a murder accused," Lallu Ram said, recalling the stigma they endured for years.

At the time of the incident in 1982, the entire family was dependent on Dhani Ram.

His prolonged entanglement in the case, they said, resulted in severe financial hardship and mental distress. "Most of our lives were spent going to courts, arranging lawyers and living with uncertainty," Lallu Ram added.

In its judgment, the high court noted that the anxiety, uncertainty and social consequences suffered by the accused over decades could not be ignored.

"The bench observed that justice is not an abstract concept divorced from human circumstances, and law cannot overlook the reality that advancing age brings weakness and dependence," said Lallu Ram The court further said that punishment aims at reform and societal good, but its moral and practical purpose diminishes when an accused has already spent the greater part of his life under the burden of a criminal case, he added.

The high court said the acquittal was based on the merits of the case, specifically the prosecution's failure to prove the charges beyond a reasonable doubt. PTI COR CDN NSD NSD