3. The case of the prosecution was that on 08.03.2012 at about 20:10 hrs., one Kishun Bahadur, resident of Village Semgarha, P.S Ikauna, District Shravasti lodged a complaint at Police Station Ikauna alleging that at about 4:00 p.m on the same day, the appellant herein took his niece aged about 6 years under the pretext of showing dance and song performances on the occasion of the Holi Festival. When the girl did not return home, a search was conducted. It was found that the appellant was not found in his house, but the dead body of the girl was found in the sugarcane field located on the southern side of the village. Another villager by name Fatehpur Bahadur, who was part of the team that searched for the missing girl, claimed to have seen the appellant leaving the sugarcane field after about half­an­hour. Therefore, invoking the last seen theory and on the basis of circumstantial evidence, the appellant was charged for the commission of the offences of raping the minor girl and murdering her. 4. The prosecution examined six witnesses, namely, (i) Kishun Bahadur, the first informant and the uncle of the victim, as PW­1; (ii) Shri Raj Karan, a localite who claimed to have seen the 2