Driving may be rash, negligent even without high speed: Court

A sessions court here has asked a trial court to retry a road accident case, in which a DTC van driver was acquitted, saying "a vehicle may be rashly or negligently driven even without high speed."
Additional Sessions Judge Pulastya Pramachala asked the trial court judge to conduct re-trial of the case, in which a biker was killed after being allegedly hit by the DTC recovery van, driven by accused Virender Singh.
The magisterial court, while acquitting Singh, had noted that the DTC van was towing another bus, hence, it was impossible for the offending vehicle to be driven at a high speed.

The sessions court, however, said that the present case "prima-facie" disclosed commission of offence under section 279 (driving rashly and negligently) and 304-A (causing death by rash or negligent act) of IPC against Singh.
"Recovery van was towing another vehicle and it is not always a case that a vehicle running at high speed only is assumed to be driven in rash or negligent manner. A vehicle may be rashly or negligently driven without high speed as well," the court said.
According to the prosecution, on December 3, 2010, Singh was driving the van in rash and negligent manner and hit a motorcycle leading to the death of its rider, Ikram.

An FIR was registered and later, a charge sheet was filed against Singh for the offences under sections of the IPC.

The trial court, however, discharged the accused observing that he was roped in the case only on the basis of statement given by an eye witness, who was produced only later by the police.
While acquitting the accused, the trial court had noted that for the sake of solving the case, a person was made to pose as an eye-witness and the involvement of DTC van was not made out.
The prosecution, however, filed an appeal before sessions court saying that the stage where accused was acquitted, was not the stage for the trial court to pass a final finding in respect of veracity of the alleged eye-witness and prosecution deserved an opportunity to prove its allegations.