UGGARSAIN (APPELLANT) Vs. THE STATE OF HARYANA & ORS. (RESPONDENT)
CRIMINAL APPEAL NO(S). 1378-1379 OF 2019
[2JB, S. RAVINDRA BHAT and DIPANKAR DATTA JJ., delivered by S. RAVINDRA BHAT, J.)
Facts: The present appeals, by special leave have been preferred by the informant/complainant against the judgment and orders passed by the High Court of Punjab and Haryana, converting the decision of conviction given by the trial court from Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 to Section 304-Part II IPC.
Issue: Whether the conversion of the decision of conviction given by the trial court from Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 to Section 304-Part II IPC, by the high court erroneous?
Arguments on behalf of counsel for appellant:
The appellants argued that the High Court was wrong in inferring that the injuries were caused due to a sudden fight. Counsel highlighted that the accused who were convicted concurrently, had deliberately gone near the informant/victims’ house to cause deadly injuries- in fact, one of the informant parties died as a consequence. Having regard to the established facts, the object of the assembly was for use of such force, which resulted in death. Therefore, the sentencing in the present case had to be fit and appropriate, and the impugned judgment gravely erred in adopting the standard of sentence undergone, which resulted in widely different and disparate results. At one end of the spectrum, one of the accused (Sundar s/o Rajpal) suffered incarceration for a little over 11 months, whereas Krishan had undergone 09 years, 05 months and 04 days. The appellant informants urged that this court should adopt a somewhat uniform sentencing standard when the role of each accused was practically indistinguishable.
Arguments on behalf of counsel for respondent:
On behalf of the accused, it was pointed out that the High Court had, in fact, gone by the salutary principles indicated by this court, in that the relative ages of the accused, their family circumstances, the length of time they spent in custody, as well as the length of time that had elapsed since the commission of the crime, all were considered.
Held: The court, while allowing the present appeal held that, “The impugned judgment fell into error in not considering the gravity of the offence. Having held all the accused criminally liable, under Section 304 Part II read with Section 149 IPC and also not having found any distinguishing feature in the form of separate roles played by each of them, the imposition of the “sentence undergone” criteria, amounted to an aberration, and the sentencing is for that reason, flawed. This court is, therefore, of the view that given the totality of circumstances the appropriate sentence would be five years rigorous imprisonment. However, at the same time, the court is cognizant of the fact Krishan and Bramhajit served more than that period. Therefore, the impugned judgment, as far as they are concerned, is left undisturbed. Consequently, the sentence of Raju, Parveen, Sunder s/o Amit Lal, Sandeep, Nar Singh, and Sunder s/o Rajpal is hereby modified; they are hereby sentenced to undergo Rigorous Imprisonment for five years.”, and thereby directed them to surrender and serve the rest of their sentences within six weeks from the date of order.”
