Neki Ram vs State of Haryana

S.D Bajaj, J.

Heard F.I. R. No. 49 dated 1411979 was registered against the accused petitioner Neki Ram under section 409 of the Indian Penal Code in Police Station, Hissar, on the allegations that, in his capacity as public servant as an employee of the Government Livestock Farm, Hissar, he had committed criminal breach of trust in respect of a sum of Rs. 66,334 11 paise in the course of year 1978. Similarly another F. I.R bearing No 243 was also registered against the accused petitioner aforesaid in Police Station, Hissar, on 2331979 under sections 467, 468, 469, 379 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code. Criminal case No. 12 of 1984 was filed in respect of the first F. I.R. No 49 of 141189 in the Court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Hissar, on 211984 and Criminal Case No. 2242 of 1981 was find against the accused petitioner in the same Court on 1.7.1981. Alleging that for the offences allegedly committed in the year 1978 for which cases were got registered with the police in the year 1919, accused petitioner is still facing prosecution and that also without any substantial progress being made therein as yet in the year 1988, the petitioner has filed the two criminal miscellaneous petitions aforesaid separately for quashing the F. I R s and the resultant criminal action being taken thereon by the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Hissar on the grounds that the inordinately delayed criminal action against him for the last 9 years is violative of the guarantee of speedy trial envisaged in Article 21 of the Constitution of India.

Factual position set out in the two criminal miscellaneous petitions aforesaid is not in dispute. While admitting Criminal Misc No. 5553M of 1988 on 2381988 my learned brother A.L. Bahri, J. had also ordered it to be heard along with Criminal Misc. No. 5555M of 1988. Since both these criminal miscellaneous petitions raise an identical question of law for determination, these are being decided together by the common order.

A perusal of the certified copies of the record of proceedings before the learned trial Court makes it abundantly clear that even on 1781988 more than 10 years after the alleged occurrence the matter was being adjourned by the learned trial Court for prosecution evidence observing that no prosecution witnesses were in attendance before it on that date in either on the two cases. In identical circumstances, the legal proposition canvassed on behalf of the accused petitioner came to be discussed in Madheshwardhari Singh and another v. State of Bihar, A.I.R. 1986 Patna 324 (Full Bench), wherein their lordships of the Patna High Court observed

"Coming nearer home, it would seem that the right to a speedy public trial as a constitutional guarantee is of a somewhat recent origin in our country However, by now it is so well settled by precedential mandate of the Final Court itself that the right to a speedy public trial is a part and parcel of the constitutional guaranteed under Art. 21, that it would be wasteful and necessary to examine the issue on principle afresh In Hussainara Khatoon v. State of Bihar AIR 1979 SC 1360, which was yet one of the series of cases from our own State, arising from the heart reading delays in the context of undertrials, Bhagwati, J. (as he then was), after in terms quoting the Sixth Amendment to the American Constitution and also Art. 3 of the European convention of Human Rights, observed as under :

We think that even under our Constitution though speedy trial is not specifically enumerated as a fundamental right it is implicit in the broad sweep and content of Art. 21 as interpreted by this Court in Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India, AIR 1978 SC 597. We have held in that case that Art. 21 confers a fundamental right on every person not to be deprived of his life or liberty except in accordance with the procedure prescribed by law and it is not enough to constitute compliance with the requirement of that Article that some semblance of a procedure should be prescribed by law. but that the procedure should be `reasonable, fair and just''. If a person is deprived of his liberty under a procedure which is not reasonable fair or just such deprivation would be violative of his fundamental right under Article 21 and he would be entitled to enforce such fundamental right and secure his release. No obviously procedure prescribed by law for depriving a person of his liberty cannot be reasonable, fair or just unless that procedure ensures a speedy trial for determination of the guilt of such person. No procedure which does not ensure a reasonably quick trial can be regarded as reasonable, fair or just and it would fall foul of Article 21. There can, therefore, be no doubt that speedy trial, and by speedy trial we mean reasonably expeditious trial. is an integral and essential part of the fundamental right to life and liberty enshrined in Article 21.

In the succeeding case of the series Hussainara Khatoon v. State of Bihar, AIR 1979 SC 1369, it was again reiterated as under :

Speedy trial is, as held by us in our earlier judgment dated 26th February, 1979, an essential ingredient of reasonable. fair and just procedure guaranteed by Article 21 and it is the constitutional obligation of the State to devise such a procedure as would ensure speedy trial of the accused.

The aforesaid view has thereafter been unhesitatingly reiterated in later judgments of the Final Court to which individual reference at this stage is unnecessary. It would suffice to mention that within this jurisdiction the issue was pointedly raised and considered in greater detail first in the State of Bihar v. Ramdaras Ahir, 1985 Cri LJ 584 (Pat)(supra). Tracing the development of the expanded right to life and personal liberty in Article 21, in paragraphs 9 to 15 of the report, it was concluded therein as under :

It is unnecessary to further elaborate and labour the point, because it seems manifest that now by precedential mandate the basic human right to speedy trial has been expressly written, as if with pen and ink, into the constitutional right of life and liberty, guaranteed by Article 21.

The aforesaid discussion would manifest that the Code of Criminal Procedure and the Bihar Police Manual not only embody the spirit of a speedy public trial but, in fact, epitomise it by express provisions mandating speedy and expeditious disposal within specified time limits. The somewhat curious argument of Mr. Mani Lal, the learned counsel for the respondent State, that giving teeth to the fundamental right to speedy public trial under Article 21 would in a way conflict with the statutory provisions of the Code seems to me as wholly ill founded and has to be rejected.

To sum up on this aspect, the answer to question No. 3 is rendered in the affirmative and it is held that speedy investigation and trial are equally mandated by both the letter and the spirit of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973".

The right to a speedy trial is not a theoretical or abstract right but one rooted in hard reality in the need to have charges promptly exposed. If the case for the prosecution calls on the accused to meet charges rather than rest on the infirmities of the prosecution''s case as is the defendant''s right, the time to meet them is when the case is fresh. Stale claims have never been favoured by the law, and far less so in criminal cases. Although a great many accused persons seek to put off the confrontation as long as possible, the right to a prompt inquiry into criminal charges is fundamental and the duty of the charging authority is to provide a prompt trial. Adverting to the limit of the period for which criminal litigation is allowed to go on at the trial stage, their lordships of the Full Bench of the Patna High Court, deciding the case aforesaid, observed :

"We are of the view that having regard to the nature of the act alleged to have been committed by the appellants and other attendant circumstances, this was a case in which the High Court should have directed the dropping of the proceedings in exercise of its inherent powers under section 482, Criminal Procedure Code, even if for some reason it come to the conclusion that the acquittal was wrong. A fresh trial nearly seven years after the alleged incident is bound to result in harassment add abuse of judicial process".

In this view of the matter, both criminal miscellaneous petitions aforesaid succeed and are allowed. Prosecution of the accused petitioner in the Court of learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Hissar, on the basis of F.I.R. No. 49 of 14179 and F.I.R. No. 243 dated 2331979 as also the two F.I.R.s themselves are all quashed.