Patna High Court: In a criminal appeal decided by a Single Judge Bench comprising of Vinod Kumar Sinha, J., the period of sentence of imprisonment inflicted upon the accused under Sections 392 and 411 of IPC along with Section 25(1)(1-B) of the Arms Act was reduced to the period of imprisonment already undergone by the accused.
The accused stood convicted by the trial court under the abovesaid sections along with other sections of the Arms Act and were sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment of five years. The said order of the trial court was challenged by the accused in the instant appeal. The High Court considered the record as well as submissions made on behalf of the parties and upheld the conviction of the accused under the sections mentioned stated above. However, the conviction of the accused under other sections of the Arms Act was set aside. Learned counsel for the accused prayed to reduce their sentence of imprisonment.
The High Court perused the record and found that the accused remained in custody for more than three years; the incident occurred in the year 2002 and as such the accused have faced rigors of trial for more than fifteen years. Considering these facts and circumstances, the Court was of the view that the sentence of imprisonment inflicted upon the accused should be reduced to the period of imprisonment already undergone by them.
The appeal was disposed with the aforesaid modification in conviction and sentence. [Ranjeet Kumar Singh v. State of Bihar, 2018 SCC OnLine Pat 449, decided on 19-03-2018]