{"id":559,"date":"2023-06-26T21:22:01","date_gmt":"2023-06-26T15:52:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/?p=559"},"modified":"2023-06-26T21:25:15","modified_gmt":"2023-06-26T15:55:15","slug":"court-records-of-criminal-trial-missing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/court-records-of-criminal-trial-missing\/","title":{"rendered":"The Supreme court sets aside a conviction since court records of criminal trial was missing."},"content":{"rendered":"

JITENDRA KUMAR RODE <\/strong>(Appellant ) Vs. <\/strong>UNION OF INDIA (<\/strong>Respondent)<\/h1>\n

(CRIMINAL APPEAL arising out of SPECIAL LEAVE PETITION NO. 2063 OF 2023)<\/p>\n

(2JB, KRISHNA MURARI and \u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00adSANJAY KAROL JJ., delivered by SANJAY KAROL, J<\/strong>.)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Facts:<\/u><\/strong> Appeal\u00a0\u00a0 arises\u00a0\u00a0 out\u00a0\u00a0 of\u00a0\u00a0 the\u00a0\u00a0 final\u00a0\u00a0 judgment\u00a0\u00a0 in Criminal Appeal passed by the High Court of Judicature at Allahabad at Lucknow by which\u00a0\u00a0 the\u00a0\u00a0 Appellant\u2019s\u00a0\u00a0 conviction\u00a0\u00a0 by\u00a0\u00a0 the\u00a0\u00a0 Special\u00a0\u00a0 Judge, (Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988) Lucknow was upheld.<\/p>\n

Issue:<\/u><\/strong> 1. whether, in the absence of the records of the Court of Trial, the appellate\u00a0\u00a0 Court\u00a0\u00a0 could\u00a0\u00a0 have\u00a0\u00a0 upheld\u00a0\u00a0 the\u00a0\u00a0 conviction\u00a0\u00a0 and enhanced the quantum of fine?<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Whether given the language employed under Section 385 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, the present situation constitutes a violation of the accused\u2019s fundamental rights under Article 21 of the Constitution of India?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Arguments on behalf of counsel for appellant:<\/u><\/strong><\/h2>\n

    It is submitted that law is settled on the issue, and in the absence of records, a conviction cannot be stated to be on firm grounds and is liable to be set aside. The learned counsel places reliance on Shyam Deo Pandey and Others v. State of Bihar<\/em><\/strong> and State of U.P. v. Abhai Raj Singh and Another, <\/em><\/strong>He further placed reliance on High Court decisions, namely Ramesh Kaushik v. State of Delhi<\/em><\/strong> of the Delhi High Court; Raghuvir Sahai and Others<\/em> v. State of U.P<\/strong>., Avdesh Rai and Others v. State of U.P.<\/em><\/strong> and Tej Pal Singh and Others v. State of U.P.<\/em><\/strong> of the Allahabad High Court.<\/p>\n

    Held:<\/u><\/strong> The court, while allowing the present appeal, set aside the impugned judgment\u00a0\u00a0 and\u00a0\u00a0 the\u00a0\u00a0 conviction passed by Special Judge (Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988), Lucknow. With regards to the first issue, the court observed that, \u201cIn the considered view of this Court, it is not within prudence to lay down a straightjacket formula, we hold that non\u00adcompliance with the mandate of the section, in certain cases contingent upon\u00a0\u00a0 specific\u00a0\u00a0 facts\u00a0\u00a0 and\u00a0\u00a0 circumstances\u00a0\u00a0 of\u00a0\u00a0 the\u00a0\u00a0 case, would result in a violation of Article 21 of the Constitution of India, which we find it to be so in the instant case.\u201d<\/em> With regards to the second issue, it was observed that \u201cThe language of Section 385 shows that the Court sitting in appeal governed thereby is required to call for the records of the case from the concerned Court below. The same is an obligation, power coupled\u00a0\u00a0 with\u00a0\u00a0 a\u00a0\u00a0 duty, and\u00a0\u00a0 only\u00a0\u00a0 after\u00a0\u00a0 the perusal of such records would an appeal be decided.\u201d <\/em>Apart from the above decision, the court issued the following directions, emphasizing the need of digitisation of records:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. The Registrar General of the High Courts shall ensure that in all cases of criminal trial, as well as civil suits, the digitization\u00a0\u00a0 of\u00a0\u00a0 records\u00a0\u00a0 must\u00a0\u00a0 be\u00a0\u00a0 duly\u00a0\u00a0 undertaken\u00a0\u00a0 with promptitude at all District Courts, preferably within the time prescribed for filing an appeal within the laws of procedure.<\/li>\n
    2. The concerned\u00a0\u00a0 District\u00a0\u00a0 Judge, once\u00a0\u00a0 the\u00a0\u00a0 system\u00a0\u00a0 of digitization along with the system of authentication of the digitized records is in place in their judgeship, to ensure that the records so digitized are verified as expeditiously as possible.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      A continually updated record of Register of Records digitized shall be maintained with periodic reports being sent to the concerned High Courts for suitable directions.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      JITENDRA KUMAR RODE (Appellant ) Vs. UNION OF INDIA (Respondent) (CRIMINAL APPEAL arising out of SPECIAL LEAVE PETITION NO. 2063 OF 2023) (2JB, KRISHNA MURARI and \u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00adSANJAY KAROL JJ., delivered by SANJAY KAROL, J.)   Facts: Appeal\u00a0\u00a0 arises\u00a0\u00a0 out\u00a0\u00a0 of\u00a0\u00a0 the\u00a0\u00a0 final\u00a0\u00a0 judgment\u00a0\u00a0 in Criminal Appeal passed by the High Court of Judicature at Allahabad […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":560,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-judgement"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=559"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":565,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559\/revisions\/565"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xpertslegal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}