Nueva Delhi: In the last year, the Supreme Court acquitted more than a dozen people, who were simultaneously convicted of the courts of first instance and the upper courts and sentenced to death or life imprisonment, in cases that included the rape of a 10 -year -old girl and the manslabras.
Despite the repeated SC decisions that the concurrent decisions of the Courts of First Instance and HCS should not be interfered unless it is considered “perverse”, the SC in most of these dozens of cases in short trials of 8-10 pages hit holes in the prosecution evidence, which were convincing in the eyes of the courts of the first instance and the HCS Convicts are not beyond reasonable.
In each of these cases, the acquittal of SC came after more than a decade of the incident. The HCS and the SC took a long time to decide the appeals of the convicts despite the fact that the courts of first instance had registered cases of convictions within a year or two. In most cases, the convicts, before their acquittal, had spent years behind bars. In one case, the convict had spent 13 years, practically a life imprisonment.
If they were innocent, or they did not declare themselves guilty, who would return their first years? Can they be monetarily compensated as after being convicted by the courts of first instance and the HCS, would not be accepted in any work? Is there no provision in the criminal law that requires the Government to compensate for a person who was innocent but who stayed in jail? Should the constitutional courts, where the appeals remained pending for years, being loaded with delayed justice?
A more important question arises since atrocious crimes involving involuntary homicide or violation-mooring are unpunished. What message, the SC, which has repeatedly advised the courts that were alive to the “shout for justice” of society, would send to the parents and relatives of the murdered person, who had felt that justice had prevailed with the concurrent convictions by the courts below?
Let’s take, for example, the case of a 10 -year -old girl, who to turn off her thirst in the scorching heat of May while granting her goats, goes to a tubewell and was raped and killed by the Tubewell operator (Ashok vs Uttar Pradesh; judgment on December 2, 2024). He was convicted and convicted of death by the Court of First Instance. Allahabad HC confirmed the conviction, but reduced the sentence to imprisonment until death.
But a bank headed by Justice as Oka, who in fact is the author of the majority of the dozens of acquittal last year in heinous crimes, discovered that the defendant did not receive a legal assistance advisor during the trial to allow him to defend himself properly, which harmed him during the trial.
“After 15 years of the incident, it would be unfair if the appellant is now told to explain the circumstances and material that appear specifically against him in evidence,” said the bank in a 37 -page sentence, 20 of which were dedicated to the mandatory obligation of the courts of first instance, as well as the prosecution to provide the accused persons with legal help if they cannot participate in a lawyer.
Another important question, which arises from the reversal of the concurrent judgments by the SC, is whether the judges of the session, who are high -level judicial officers and the HC judges did not train enough to change the straw of the grain while analyzing evidence in sensitive criminal cases.
Judge Oka led the bank seems to adopt the maximum ‘is better than 100 guilty people escape, that that innocent person should suffer.’ In the Criminal Justice System of India, the Police are not obliged to resume investigations in cases of murder if the convict is acquitted by the highest court. For years, they are satisfied that the evidence collected by them resulted in a conviction in the Court of First Instance and confirmed by the HC. But, in the dozen cases of acquittal, murders would continue to be a mystery.