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2009 DIGILAW 556 (PAT)

Suraj Singh @ Suraj Bhan Singh v. State Of Bihar

2009-04-08

DHARNIDHAR JHA, SHIVA KIRTI SINGH

body2009
JUDGEMENT 1. Heard learned counsel for the appellant, learned counsel for the State and learned counsel for the informant in respect of I.A. No. 194 of 2009 through which the, appellant has prayed for an order to stay or suspend the order of conviction awarded by the trial court through the judgment under appeal. 2. The scope and ambit of Section 389(1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure now stand well clarified by judgments of the Apex Court, such as, in the case of Ravi Kant S. Patil V/s. Sarvabhouma S. Bagli reported in (2007)1 S.C.C. 673 and other judgment in the case of Navjot Singh Sidhu V/s. State of Punjab, (2007)2 S.C.C. 574 [: 2007(1) PLJR (SC)329]. Recently this Court also considered the scope of the said provision of law in the case of Rajesh Ranjan @ Pappu Yadav V/s. State of Bihar in Cr. Appeal (D.B.) 418 of 2008 as appears from the order dated 2.4.2009, in this lssue at pg. 650 [ 2009(2) PLJR 650 ]. a copy whereof was produced by learned counsel for the appellant for our perusal. 3. The prayer requires us to look at the salient features of the case as alleged and other relevant circumstances with a view to find out whether exceptional circumstances exist for exercise of the power in favour of the appellant requiring stay of conviction. 4. In this case the appellant along-with some others has been convicted for the offences under Sections 148, 302/149 of the Indian Penal Code and Section 27 of the Arms Act and sentenced to R.I. for life and also a fine of Rs. 25,000/- was imposed for the major offence and R.I. for three years for the offence under Section 148 of the I.P.C. and Section 27 of the Arms Act as alleged. 5. Our attention was drawn to the order of this Court dated 16th July, 2008 by which the appellant was allowed bail in this appeal. On that basis it was submitted that this Court has doubted the claim of some of the witnesses who later on alleged specific allegation of firing at the deceased against this appellant whereas in the F.I.R. and evidence of some other witnesses the allegation against all the accused persons was in general terms that they all fired indiscriminately causing death of the deceased. 6. 6. On going through the entire materials on record including the prosecution case initially reported and the evidence adduced in court, we find that the appellant is one of the accused named since beginning and there is no material to hold at this stage that the prosecution case regarding death of the deceased and participation of the named accused persons is false. Otherwise also, we do not find any exceptional circumstance in this case so that we may treat it as one of the rarest case to stay the conviction of the appellant to enable him to overcome the bar of contesting Parliamentary Election which he has incurred due to conviction in this case. 7. On behalf of the State, a counter affidavit has been filed which contained nothing useful except an Annexure to show the case in which the appellant has been convicted or charge-sheeted or which are pending for investigation. The list shows that the appellant has been convicted in the present case only but in six other cases he has been charge-sheeted and investigation is pending in other two cases. 8. Be that as it may, in the facts of the case noticed above, we do not find it a fit case for exercise of power under Section 389(1) Cr.P.C. 9. The prayer made in this I.A. is rejected.