BED RAJ v. THE STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH.
Citation: [1955] 2 S.C.R. 583; 1955 INSC 48
Court: Supreme Court of India
Bench: VIVIAN BOSE , B. JAGANNADHADAS, BHUVNESHWAR PRASAD SINHA
Judgment date:
Case summary
1955 INSC 48. Supreme Court of India judgment dated 1955-09-28. BED RAJ v. THE STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH. Read the judgment and case details on LawSphereX.
Judgment text
BED RAJ v. THE STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH. [VIVIAN BosE, JAGANNADHADAS and B. P. SINHA JJ. ] Sentence, Enhancement of-By the High Court-Principles applicable thereto. A question of sentence is a matter of discretion and it is well settled that when discretion has been properly exercised along accepted judicial lines, an appellate court should not interfere to the detriment of an accused person except for very strong reasons which must be disclosed on the face of the judgment. In a matter of enhancement there should not be interference when the sentence passed imposes substantial punishment. Interference is only called for when it is manifestly inadequate. In the circumstances and bearing all the considerations of the present case in mind it was impossible to hold that the Sessions Judge did not impose a substantial sentence.
The Supreme Court set aside the sentence imposed by the High Court and restored that of the Sessions Judge as no adequate reason had been assigned by the High Court for considering the sentence passed by the Sessions Judge as manifestly inadequate. Dalip Singh v. State of Punjab ([1954] S. C. R. 145) and Nar Singh v. State pf Uttar Pradesh ([1955] 1 S. C. R. 238), referred to. CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Criminal Appeal No. 88 of 1954. Appeal by Special Leave from the Judgment and Order dated the 7th January, 19~4 of · the Allahabad High Court in Criminal Appeal No. 377 of 1953 con-nected with Crimizial Revision No. 461 of 1953 arising out of the Judgment and Order dated the 17th Nov-ember, 1952 of the Court of Additional Sessions Judge at Meerut in Session Trial No. 113 of 1952. B. B. Tawakley, (K. P. Gupta, with him), for the appellant. K. B. Asthana and C. P. Lal, for the respondent. 1955. September 28. The Judgment of the Court was delivered by BosE J.
-The only question here is about sentence. The appellant Bed Raj and another, Sri Chand were jointly charged with the murder of one Pheru. The Sessions Judge convicted Bed Raj under section 304, Indian Penal Code, and sentenced him to three years' rigorous imprisonment. He 'acquitted Sri Chand. Bed Raj appealed to the High Court and that Court, on admitting the appeal for hearing, issued notice to the appellant to show cause why the sentence should not be enhanced. The· appeal and the rev1S1on were heard together. The appeal was dis-missed and the High Court enhanced the sentence to ten years. Now, though no limitation has been placed on the High Court's power to enhance it is nevertheless a judicial act and, like all judicial acts involving an exercise of discretion, must be exercised along well known ju_dicial lines. The only question before us is wheth"r those lines have been observed in the present case.
The facts that have been found by the Sessions Judge and accepted by the High Court are to be found in the opening paragraph of the lear. ned Sessions Judge's judgment. They are as follows : "Roop Chand, the son of Bed Raj accused, was removing the dung of the bullocks of Pheru deceased from an open space near his cattle shed. Pheru pro-tested to the boy and turned down the basket in which the boy had put the dung. The two accused who are brothers then came to the scene from their own cattle shed which was near by and there was an exchange of abuses between them and Pheru. The accused Sri Chand then caught hold of Pheru by the waist and Bed Raj accused took out a knife and stabbed him in 3 or 4 places. The knife was then left sticking in the neck of the deceased and the accused ran away". The assault occurred about 8 o'clock on the morn-ing of the 23rd February 1952. Pheru was removed to the hospital and the Medical Officer Dr. Fa.
teh Singh examined him and found that he was suffering from shock. He found three injuries on his person : all "simple". He· gave the following description of them: " ( 1) Incised and punctured wound f'Xf'X(' neck, right side lower part. (2) Incised wound 1 X "l" X ! " right deltoid regior. frontal and lower part above downward. 1 (3) Incised wound f'X /s" pugned Act w:iS
Source: Supreme Court eSCR. Dataset: Dattam Labs, CC BY 4.0. Text extracted automatically; compare with the source PDF for layout and accuracy.