Supreme Court Upholds Conviction of Husband Who Conspired to Kill Wife, Confirms Acquittal of Alleged Paramour
A Division Bench upheld murder convictions built entirely on circumstantial evidence, holding call records, location data, and post-incident conduct formed an unbroken chain of guilt.
The Supreme Court on 20 July 2026 dismissed the criminal appeals of three convicts — Piyush Shyamdasani (A1), Renu @ Akhilesh Kanaujiya (A4), and Sonu Kashyap (A5) — and upheld their conviction for the murder of Jyoti Shyamdasani @ Pooja Nagdev, wife of A1. The Court found that call detail records, mobile location data, post-incident conduct, and physical recoveries together formed a complete and consistent chain of circumstantial evidence pointing solely to the guilt of the appellants. At the same time, the Court confirmed the acquittal of Manisha Makhija (A2), the neighbour whom the prosecution alleged was A1's paramour and a co-conspirator, holding that the evidence fell short of drawing her into the criminal conspiracy. The judgment was authored by Justice Satish Chandra Sharma.
How the Case Reached the Supreme Court
The case was registered as Crime No. 151/2014 at Police Station Swaroop Nagar, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh. After trial, the Trial Court convicted six accused persons for offences punishable under Sections 302, 364, 201, 203, and 404 read with Section 120-B of the Indian Penal Code, 1860.
The convicts challenged the Trial Court's judgment before the High Court of Judicature at Allahabad through separate criminal appeals, with the lead appeal being Criminal Appeal No. 8254/2022. By a common judgment dated 29 November 2024, the High Court upheld the conviction of A1 and A3 to A6. The only departure from the Trial Court's findings was the acquittal of Manisha Makhija (A2), who had been convicted under Sections 302/120-B and 201/120-B of the IPC. The High Court acquitted her for want of sufficient evidence.
Four separate appeals then came before the Supreme Court. Three were preferred by the convicts — A1, A4, and A5. The fourth was filed by the State of Uttar Pradesh, challenging A2's acquittal. Leave was granted in SLP(Crl.) No. 12964 of 2025, SLP(Crl.) No. 19093 of 2025, and SLP(Crl.) No. 2043 of 2026.
The Prosecution's Case: A Dinner Plan as a Murder Plan
A1 married the deceased on 28 November 2012. The marital relationship deteriorated, and the deceased suspected that A1 was having an affair with A2, a neighbour. She confided in her family members and also recorded her experiences in a personal diary, which was identified during trial by witnesses PW-3 and PW-6. On the date of the incident itself, the deceased was troubled enough to call her aunt (PW-7) in panic from the restaurant while A1 was at a distance on his phone.
On 27 July 2014, A1 took the deceased for dinner to Veranda Restaurant in Kanpur. They entered at around 10:30 pm and left together at 11:30 pm in A1's Honda Accord car bearing number UP-78-BR-5009. According to the prosecution, the outing was planned after the conspiracy to kill the deceased had already been set in motion. While the couple was still at the restaurant, A1 was in constant telephonic contact with A2 and the other accused persons.
After leaving the restaurant, A3 to A6 stopped the car. A1 stepped out and A3 to A6 drove away with the deceased. She was later found dead inside the car at approximately 12:05 AM. A1 initially filed a complaint claiming unknown persons had hit the car, dragged him out, and abducted his wife. Investigation showed the car bore no damage and A1 had not suffered a single injury. He abruptly left the hospital before his medical examination could be completed. He also waited approximately one hour before making his first approach to the police.
What the Court Held on Circumstantial Evidence and Conspiracy
The Court framed the central question as whether the High Court had erred in upholding the conviction of the appellants and in acquitting A2 on the basis of the evidence on record. It prefaced its analysis with a brief discussion on appellate principles, noting that in an appeal against conviction, the presumption of innocence is displaced once conviction is recorded, and is further reinforced when both the Trial Court and the High Court have returned consistent findings.
The Court found the technical and oral evidence to be mutually corroborative. Between 11:44 AM and 10:42 PM on 27 July 2014, A1 and A2 exchanged 18 calls. At 10:42 PM — while A1 was already in the restaurant with the deceased — A2 switched off her number. Call detail records showed A1 was simultaneously in contact with A3 and A5. A3, A4, and A5 were in contact with each other. Mobile location data placed all the accused persons in the vicinity of the restaurant at the time of the incident, and also traced A3 to A6 to the same spot where the deceased was found in the car.
The appellants argued that the mobile numbers in the call records were not registered in their names and therefore could not be attributed to them. The Court rejected this, treating it as an additional incriminating circumstance. The numbers were found running in mobile devices either recovered from the accused persons or traceable to them. A1 was admittedly using two numbers, one registered in his own name and one in the name of an employee, and had himself mentioned both in his original complaint. The number attributed to A4 was found in the phone recovered from him. The number attributed to A5 was installed in a phone left at his home when he fled after the incident; when investigators called the number, A5's mother answered and confirmed it was used by A5. No rebuttal was offered to any of these facts.
The Court also addressed the failure of the accused to explain incriminating circumstances within their personal knowledge. The absence of injuries on A1, his departure from the hospital, his delay in approaching the police, his continuous phone contact with co-accused during the dinner — none of these were explained. The Court held that this failure justified a direct adverse inference against the accused persons.
Physical Recoveries and the Role of Section 27 of the Evidence Act
Recoveries made from A4 and A5 included blood-stained articles, the key to the Honda Accord car, clothes worn on the date of the incident, four knives including the knife used in the commission of the offence, and jewellery items belonging to the deceased. The Court held that since all these recoveries were based on the exclusive disclosures of the accused persons, they were admissible under Section 27 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872.
On the question of the knife, the Court noted two things. The nature of the injuries on the deceased substantially corresponded with the knife recovered. Additionally, CCTV footage from Rev Moti Mall and purchase invoices proved that the knife had been purchased by A1 and A3 from the mall. The appellants contended that A1 was not identifiable in the footage, but produced no counter-evidence. The Court found the invoices corroborated the footage and declined to disturb the consistent findings of the courts below on bare submissions.
The Court separately addressed the argument that the absence of any monetary transaction between A1 and the other accused persons weakened the conspiracy charge. The alleged payment of Rs. 50,000 was said to rest solely on inadmissible confessional statements. The Court's reasoning on the overall chain of circumstances, however, did not depend on this specific allegation.
Motive, Section 34 IPC, and the Section 313 Challenge
The appellants argued that the prosecution had not proved motive. The Court found ample evidence of motive in the strained marital relationship, the deceased's documented complaints about A1's behaviour and suspected affair, and the absence of any other explanation for the killing. The deceased had not been subjected to any sexual assault and her jewellery had not been taken by A3 to A6, ruling out robbery or assault as the object. The Court held that the only consistent explanation was A1's desire to remove his wife.
On the broader role of motive in circumstantial evidence cases, the Court drew on its earlier decision in Vaibhav v. State of Maharashtra (2025 INSC 800), which held that while motive is relevant in such cases, its complete absence does not automatically disrupt the chain of evidence if the remaining evidence is sufficient to prove guilt. Here, motive was affirmatively proved, further reinforcing the prosecution's case.
A legal submission was advanced that since more than five persons were accused, the court ought to have applied Section 141 and Section 142 of the IPC governing unlawful assembly, rather than Section 34. The Court rejected this. It found that the actual act of murder was committed by A3 to A6 alone, being four persons. A1's participation was behind the scenes and not part of the physical assembly that carried out the killing. Section 34, which requires active participation and not physical presence, was therefore correctly applied. The Court described the submission as based on an erroneous understanding of law.
On the Section 313 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 challenge — that incriminating circumstances were not put to the accused persons separately — the Court did not find this ground sufficient to disturb concurrent findings where the overall evidence was overwhelming and the accused had failed to offer any explanation for circumstances within their personal knowledge.
Acquittal of Manisha Makhija Confirmed
The State's appeal against A2's acquittal was dismissed. The Court held that the evidence against A2 consisted only of the call records showing an unusually high number of calls between her and A1. While this could support an inference of a relationship between them, it could not, by itself, establish her participation in the criminal conspiracy to kill the deceased.
The Court found a clear break in the chain of circumstances so far as A2 was concerned. There was no evidence of any prior connection between A2 and A3 to A6. The call detail records did not place A2 at the same level as the other accused. The Court noted that A2 had been exploring prospects of marriage with other persons and there was no basis to conclude she stood to benefit from the deceased's death. The acquittal of A2 was accordingly confirmed.
In doing so, the Court applied the principle articulated with reference to Mallappa & Ors. v. State of Karnataka (2024 INSC 104): in an appeal against acquittal, an acquittal reinforces the presumption of innocence and if the view of acquittal is one of the possible views on the evidence, it is not disturbed.
Order
The Court dismissed the appeals filed by Piyush Shyamdasani (A1), Renu @ Akhilesh Kanaujiya (A4), and Sonu Kashyap (A5). Their convictions were upheld and they were directed to serve their sentences in accordance with law. Each was directed to surrender before the concerned Jail Superintendent within one week from the date of judgment, if not already in custody.
The State's appeal against the acquittal of Manisha Makhija (A2) was also dismissed, and her acquittal was confirmed. All four captioned appeals were disposed of in terms of the judgment. Any pending interim applications were also disposed of.