Rajasthan High Court - Jaipur
Mohan Lal Alias Hanuman Singh vs State Of Rajasthan on 9 January, 1987
Equivalent citations: 1987(1)WLN657
JUDGMENT Navin Chandra Sharma, J.
1. Stricken poverty must have led this young lad of 20 years Mohan Lal alias Hanuman Singh petitioner to earn his livelihood by committing patty thefts and breaking locks of some residential houses and commercial premises. The booty collected by the petitioner is not much. He fairly and frankly confessed his guilt in all the cases probably under the belief that Lok Adalat would give him some clemency for getting that the Lok Adalats are not meant for thefts and persons committing lurking home trespass. By that as all it may, in ten criminal cases launched by the police against him, he was convicted and sentenced to various terms of imprisonment and fine on three dates in the months of October, 1986, i.e. 14th, 15th and 18th October, N 86 by the Judicial Magistrate No. 5, Jaipur City, Jaipur. The sentences awarded in these criminal cases are under law to run consecutively. Thus for all these conviction this young lad of 20 years will have to remain in jail 17 years and 6 months and shall have to pay a total amount of Rs. 3000/- as fine.
2. Looking to the petty nature of thefts and the small amount to booty collected by the petitioner in all the thefts, it is in the interest of justice that for these petty thefts, the petitioner should not remain in jail such a long period of 17-1/2 years and some of the sentences should be made to run concurrently with others. There have been cases if this type which have been decided by the Court. The first case brought to my notice by the learned Counsel for the petitioner is the case of Jeevan and Ors. v. State reported in 1970 WLN (Part I) 449. In that case three persons had been convicted in three cases. His Lordship S.N. Modi, J. laid down in Jeevan's case that under Section 397 of the Old Criminal Procedure Code, which corresponds to Section 427 of the new Code, where several sentences are passed against the same persons, such sentences should ordinarily run consecutively, i.e, one after the expiration of the other unless the court directs that they should run concurrently. That section decidedly lay down that the order about the running of the sentences concurrently with the previous sentences must be made a part of the subsequent judgment. It can be made by the court even after the subsequent judgment has been given. In this view of the matter, his Lordship held that it could not be said that there was any specific provision in the Code to the contrary which debarred the High Court to exercise inherent powers under Section 561A of the Old Code which corresponds to Section 482 of the new Code. Following the decision of Division Bench of the Calcutta High Court in Janta Kumar Banerjee v. State , his Lordship directed under inherent powers of this court that three petitioners in that case, who had been sentenced separately by the courts convicting them, shall undergo the sentences concurrently. Again in the case of Bachna Ram v. State of Rajasthan reported in 1984 Raj Cr. Cases 306 his Lordship S.K. Mal Lodha, J. on the basis of the decision in Jeeva's case ordered that four sentences awarded to Bachna Ram for the offence under Section 457 I.P.C. on different dates by the same Magistrate shall run concurrently.
3. Following these precedents and looking to the facts and circumstances of the case already enumerated above, I am of the view that the ends of justice will be met if the petitioner Mohan Lal undergoes sentences awarded to him in criminal cases No. 59 of 1984, 38 of 1984 and 144 of 1984 consecutively and if he undergoes 9 rest of the sentences in the remaining seven cases concurrently with the sentences in the first three cases. The imposition of the sentence of fine will remain intact. The period during which the petitioner has already remained in jail after the awarding of the first sentence shall be deducted from the consecutive period of sentences of first three cases referred to above.
4. Accordingly this petition under Section 482 Cr. P.C. is partly allowed and the modified sentence shall be given effect to by the Judicial Magistrate No. 5 Jaipur City Jaipur and by jail Authorities.