Supreme Court - Daily Orders
Mahabir Prashad vs State Of Haryana on 21 November, 2014
Bench: Madan B. Lokur, R. Banumathi
ITEM NO.53 COURT NO.9 SECTION IIB
S U P R E M E C O U R T O F I N D I A
RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS
Petition(s) for Special Leave to Appeal (Crl.) No(s). 6085/2014
(Arising out of impugned final judgment and order dated 30/01/2014
in CRA-S-459-SB of 1999 passed by the High Court of Punjab &
Haryana at Chandigarh)
MAHABIR PARSHAD Petitioner(s)
VERSUS
STATE OF HARYANA Respondent(s)
(with appln. (s) for suspension of sentence and taking additional
document on record and office report)
Date : 21/11/2014 This petition was called on for hearing today.
CORAM :
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE MADAN B. LOKUR
HON'BLE MRS. JUSTICE R. BANUMATHI
For Petitioner(s) Mr. Ghan Shyam Vasisht,Adv.
Mr. R.P. Kaushik, Adv.
Mr. Om Prakash Mishra, Adv.
Mr. K.B.B.Singh, Adv.
For Respondent(s) Mr. Sukhmani Bajwa, Adv.
Mr. Manoj Sharan, Adv.
Mr. Kamal Mohan Gupta,Adv.
UPON hearing the counsel the Court made the following
O R D E R
Leave granted.
The appeal is disposed of in terms of the Signed Order.
Signature Not Verified (Rajni Mukhi) (Jaswinder Kaur) Digitally signed by Sr. P.A. Court Master Rajni Mukhi Date: 2014.11.28 16:07:37 IST Reason:
(Signed Order is placed on the file) IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 2468 OF 2014 (Arising out of SLP (Crl.) No. 6085 of 2014) MAHABIR PARSHAD .......APPELLANT VERSUS STATE OF HARYANA …......RESPONDENT O R D E R Leave granted.
We have heard the learned counsel for the parties. The appellant was convicted for offences punishable under section 7(1)(a)(ii) and Section 3(2)(f)(a) of the Essential Commodities Act, 1955.
The Trial Court sentenced the appellant for four years rigorous imprisonment and fine of Rs.2,000/- and in default of payment of fine to further udnergo rigorous imprisonment for one year. In appeal, the High Court reduced the sentence to a period of three years rigorous imprisonment while maintaining the fine but modified the default clause to two months instead of one year.
We are not inclined to interfere with the conviction of the appellant.
However, as far as the question of sentence is concerned, the offence was committed by the appellant about 30 years ago and he has already undergone seven months imprisonment while the minimum imprisonment shall not be less than three months which may be extended upto seven years.
Looking into the facts and circumstances of the case, we are of the view that the sentence of the appellant may be modified to the period already undergone.
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On an earlier occasion, it was put to learned counsel for the appellant whether he would like to take instructions from his client and whether he is prepared to pay a minimum fine of Rs. 1,00,000/-.
Learned counsel for the appellant stated that his client was prepared to pay a fine of Rs.1,00,000/-. The amount has already been deposited in the Registry of this Court. Accordingly we enhance the fine from Rs.2,000/- to Rs. 1,00,000/- . The state is at liberty to withdraw the deposited amount, with interest, if any.
The appeal is disposed of on the above terms.
.........................J. [MADAN B. LOKUR] …........................J. [R. BANUMATHI] NEW DELHI;
NOVEMBER 21, 2014