The Supreme Court on 25th April, 2018 considered long delay Of Trials, Quantum of Punishment Already Undergone and Medicial Infirmity As Valid Grounds For Reducing The Quantum Of Punishment. This decision was given by the bench of Hon’ble Justices R.K Agarwal and Abhay Manohar Sapre in the case of Naresh & Ors. V. The State of Uttarakhand & Ors. [CRIMINAL APPEAL NOs. 394-395 OF 2018]
The appellants herein were the accused. They are Naresh (A-1), Suresh (A-2), Ashish (A-3) and Rajendra (A-4). These four accused faced prosecution for commission of offences punishable under Sections 307/34, 323/34, 324/34 and 504 of the IPC.In short, the prosecution case against these four appellants was that on 26.05.1998, they attacked one person by name “Tej Singh” with axe and caused injuries to him on his body. The injuries were abrasion, contusion, and one lacerated wound
It is this incident which led to filing of FIR (No.83/1998) on 27.05.1998 by PW-4 Jaswir Singh against four accused in PS Haridwar-Laksar. The four appellants were accordingly apprehended and put to trial. The Additional Sessions Judge, Haridwar, by order dated 16.03.2011, acquitted allthe four appellants (accused).
The State and the Complainant felt aggrieved and filed leave to file appeals before the High Court seeking permission to question the legality and correctness of the order of the appellants’ acquittal. Leave was granted. Naresh Kumar(A-1) also filed Criminal Appeal No.126 of 2011 before the High Court.
By impugned judgment, the High Court allowed the appeals filed by the Complainant and the State and set aside the order passed by the Additional Sessions Judge, Haridwar and sentenced all the accused persons for the offences punishable under various sections mentioned supra.
However, taking into consideration the disease suffered by Suresh(A-2), i.e., advanced stage of lung cancer, he was sentenced to undergo two years rigorous imprisonment under Section 307 IPC. The Court directed the State to admit him at Civil hospital, Roorkee for medical treatment.
The appellants (accused) felt aggrieved by the judgment of the High Court and filed these appeals by way of special leave before the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court in its decision said ” Having heard the learned counsel for the parties and on perusal of the record of the case, we are inclined to allow the appeals in part in so far as Suresh-Accused No.2 (appellant No. 2 herein) is concerned and acquit him of the charges by restoring the order of the Additional Sessions Judge.”
The court further added “So far as the remaining three accused- appellants are concerned, namely, the appellant Nos.1, 3 and 4, we modify their respective jail sentences awarded by the High Court mentioned above and reduced to what they have already undergone and enhance the fine amount awarded.”
The Supreme Court was inclined to do so for the foll reasons, First, the incident is of 1998 and we are in 2018. In other words, it was now almost 20 years have passed that this litigation is pending in various Courts.
Second, there were seven injuries noticed by the doctor on the body of injured-Tej Singh but the injuries noticed were not very serious in nature as would be clear from the Doctor’s report mentioned above.
Third, Tej Singh survived leaving no disability much less permanent on his body due to causing of the injuries and lived for twenty years after the date of alleged incident and died recently in last week as was stated by learned counsel for the appellants.
Fourth, all the appellants(accused) have undergone almost one year of jail sentence including remission out of the total jail sentence awarded by the High Court except appellant No.2 – Suresh(A-2), who underwent around three months.
Fifth, all the appellants were first offender and were not found involved in any criminal activity in the last 20 years, though remained on bail throughout and lastly, appellant Nos. 2 and 3 are reported to be in Government Service.