Two criminal appeals before the Supreme Court challenged a Madras High Court (Madurai Bench) judgment that had substantially enhanced the convictions of A-1 (Senthil) and A-2 (Sivakumar) arising from a 2014 boundary-dispute altercation between close relatives. The Trial Court had convicted A-1 under Section 324 IPC (voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapon) and A-2 under Section 325 IPC (grievous hurt), acquitting both of the murder charge. The High Court reversed the acquittal under Section 294(b) IPC, affirmed A-1's conviction under Section 324, additionally convicted A-1 under Section 304 Part II read with Section 34 IPC, and upgraded A-2's conviction from Section 325 to Section 304 Part II IPC — sentencing both to five years R.I. for the culpable homicide charge.
The Supreme Court partly allowed both appeals. On Section 294(b), the Court held that mere use of the word 'bastard' during a heated exchange does not arouse prurient interest and therefore does not constitute obscenity within the meaning of Section 294(b) IPC, relying on Apoorva Arora & Anr. v. State (Govt. of NCT of Delhi) & Anr. (2024) 6 SCC 181, which distinguishes vulgarity and profanity from obscenity. Accordingly, the conviction of both appellants under Section 294(b) was set aside. On A-1's liability under Section 304 Part II read with Section 34, the Court found no reliable evidence that A-1 shared a common intention with A-2 to cause death or such bodily injury as is likely to cause death — A-1's blows had fallen on the intervening witness (PW-4), not the deceased, and there was no evidence of exhortation or post-fall assault — and set aside that conviction, confirming only the Section 324 conviction. A-2's conviction under Section 304 Part II was confirmed, the Court finding no error in the High Court's conclusion that A-2 had knowledge his act was likely to cause death, given the severity of the skull fracture and his own utterances at the time.
On sentence, A-1's sentence was reduced to the period already undergone (approximately one month twenty-five days). A-2's five-year R.I. was reduced to three years R.I., the Court weighing the heat-of-the-moment nature of the incident, the use of a log found on the spot rather than a brought weapon, the solitary blow inflicted, and the close-relative/boundary-dispute context. The Court expressly declined to consider whether A-2 ought to have been convicted under Section 304 Part I (the graver limb) in the absence of a State or victim appeal seeking enhancement.