Singhasan Singh vs State of U.P.

Amar Saran and S.K. Jain, JJ.—We have heard learned Counsel for the appellant and learned AGA.

The applicant had obtained bail on 4.3.2003 when his appeal against his conviction and sentence to imprisonment for life and a fine of Rs. 5,000/-under Section 302/149 IPC; to 10 years'' RI and a fine of Rs. 2,000/- u/s 326/149 IPC; to one year''s RI u/s 147 IPC, was admitted by Hon''ble I.M. Murtuza, J. He has now moved an application on 31.1.2007 praying that the conviction awarded to him be stayed in view of the decision of the apex court passed in Crl. Appeal No. 59 of 2007: Navjot Singh Sidhu v. State of Punjab and Ors. which was decided on 23.1.2007 and whose copy has been annexed with the affidavit to the application.

The contention of the learned Counsel for the appellant is that in view of his conviction he would not be eligible for contesting for election although he had participated in the elections for the office of MLA in the years 1984, 1996, 1998 and 2002 and that in the year 1998 he was even elected to the office of MLA in the State of U.P.

We think that the appellant cannot be granted the prayer made by this belated application.

In our view, the facts of the case of Navjot Singh Sidhu (supra) are clearly distinguishable. In the said case of Navjot Singh Sidhu (supra), the appellant, Navjot Singh Sidhu had been acquitted of the charges u/s 302 IPC and had only been convicted and awarded a Sentence of 3 years'' RI and a fine of Rs. 1,000/- u/s 304, Part II, IPC. The special circumstances of that case were that after pronouncement of the judgment by the High Court, which had reversed the acquittal by the trial court and recorded the conviction of the appellant, Navjot Singh Sidhu, as aforesaid, had resigned from the membership of the Lok Sabha for maintaining probity and moral values in public life. However, as he wanted to remain in public life and, for that purpose, wanted to contest the election again and face the electorate, in the changed scenario he had moved the application seeking suspension of the order of conviction. The two-Judge Bench of the apex court in Navjot Singh''s case (supra) observed that in view of Section 8(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, (hereinafter referred to as the Act), as the appellant had been awarded a sentence exceeding two years, he would have been disqualified from the date of conviction for a period of 6 years for contesting any election to the parliament or legislative assembly or council of the State. It was further observed that the appellant, Navjot Singh Sidhu, could easily have avoided this disqualification if he had not resigned from the seat of Member of Parliament on moral grounds but had continued on his seat, ''then, in view of Section 8(4) of the Act for a period of 3 months, he would not have been disqualified from being a Member of Parliament and in the meanwhile if he preferred an appeal, then till the disposal of the appeal by the Court. Therefore, there were exceptional circumstances for granting the extraordinary relief of staying the conviction because the normal order that is to be passed in such matters is only of suspension of the execution of the sentence when an accused is enlarged on bail. The order of suspension of conviction is passed in on extremely rare circumstances. Furthermore, it has been observed in the judgment of the apex court that at the material time when the (sic) took place, i.e. 1988, the appellant was not an MP and he had not taken on advantage of his position as MP for committing the crime. Moreover, the medical evidence was also not clear as to whether the fists'' blow, which had been received by the deceased, Gurnam Singh, at the hands of the appellant, resulted in his death or his death was due to heart attack as the deceased was suffering from heart disease and the incident had taken place at the spur of the moment when the deceased was trying to overtake the Gypsy vehicle driven by the appellant and his companion. In the normal circumstances, as has been observed in the case of Navjot Singh Sidhu (supra). relying on a three-judge Bench decision in Ravikant S. Patel v. Sarvahhouma S. Bagali JT 2006 1 SC 578 ; State of Tamil Nadu Vs. A. Jaganathan, K.C. Sareen Vs. C.B.I., Chandigarh, : State of Maharashtra Vs. Gajanan and Another, , though there may be a power to stay the conviction, but the same was to be exercised only in the most exceptional circumstances where failure to stay the conviction would lead to injustice and irreversible consequences. The said exception has to be resorted to in the rarest of rare cases depending upon the facts of the case.

Where the execution of the sentence is stayed, the conviction continues to operate, but where the conviction itself is stayed, the fact is that the conviction will not be operative from the date of stay although the stay does not render the conviction non-existent but only non-operative. The requirement was that the appeal should have specifically drawn the attention of the appellate court to the consequences that may arise or if the conviction was not stayed. We find here that the appellant''s counsel has neither pointed out how the offence for which he was convicted was not of a grave nature and how he would suffer from the disabilities if after 41/4 years the order of conviction was not stayed except making general averments that his eligibility to contest for in the electoral office would be adversely affected. Furthermore, in the two-judge decisions of B.R. Kapoor v. Tamil Nadu and Anr. : AIR2001SC3435 and P. Prabhakaran Vs. P. Jayarajan, , it has been observed that the appellant would not be absolved of the disqualifications even if the order of suspension or stay of the conviction was passed by the appellant court.

In this view of the matter, we find no reason for granting the relief desired of suspending the execution of the sentence and the application preferred by the applicant-appellant is rejected.