The Supreme Court has once again expressed its displeasure with an order of the Allahabad High Court for failing to apply settled legal principles while rejecting a plea for suspension of sentence in a fixed-term conviction.
The observations from the top court came days after it pulled up an Allahabad High Court judge for allowing criminal proceedings in a civil dispute case.
In an unprecedented order, a bench of Justices J B Pardiwala and R Mahadevan on August 4 stripped criminal matters of the roster of a Allahabad High Court judge "till he demits office" after he "erroneously" upheld summons of criminal nature in a civil dispute.
The same bench came hard on the high court decision in another case.
"The impugned Order is one more from the High Court of Judicature at Allahabad with which we are disappointed," it said, adding that this plea arose from an order passed by the High Court on May 29, in a criminal appeal by which the high court declined to suspend the substantive order of sentence passed by the trial court.
"We are once again constrained to observe that such errors creep in at the level of the High Court and only because the wellsettled principles of law on the subject are not applied correctly.
"It is very important to first look into the subject-matter. Thereafter the court should look into the issue involved. In the last the court should look into the plea of the litigant and then proceed to apply the correct principles of law," Justice Pardiwala said in an order on August 6.
The apex court observed that the High Court's order was legally flawed and demonstrated a disregard for established jurisprudence.
It was hearing an appeal filed by a convict who had been sentenced to four years of rigorous imprisonment under various provisions of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, Indian Penal Code (IPC), and the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989. The sentences were ordered to run concurrently.
The convict had approached the high court with an application under Section 389 of the Criminal Procedure Code, seeking suspension of his sentence.
However, the high court rejected the plea solely on the ground that the offence was "heinous", without evaluating the request in light of the settled law.
Setting aside the high court's order, bench cited a landmark judgment which mandates that appellate courts should adopt a liberal approach in suspending fixed-term sentences unless exceptional circumstances exist.
Emphasizing the need for judicial clarity, the bench said, "It is very important to first look into the subject matter. Thereafter, the court should examine the issues involved, and only then consider the plea of the litigant before applying the correct principles of law." The apex court took particular issue with the high court's failure to analyze the application on legal grounds.
"What the high court did was to reiterate the prosecution's case and the oral evidence, without engaging with the legal test for suspension of sentence in a fixed-term conviction," the bench observed.
It has now remanded the matter back to the high court for fresh consideration, directing it to pass an appropriate order within 15 days.
"The High Court shall keep in mind that the sentence is for a fixed term, that is four years and it is only if there are compelling circumstances indicating that release would not be in public interest, that suspension may be denied," the order clarified.
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