UMMADI VENKATESWARLU v. THE STATE OF ANDHRA PRADESH

Counsel for the Respondent:

1. PUBLIC PROSECUTOR (AP) The Court made the following: ORDER: 2 The Criminal Revision Case has been filed under Sections 397 and 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for brevity ‘the Cr.P.C.,’) challenging the judgment dated 02.01.2020 in Crl.A.No.129 of 2017 on the file of the learned Special Judge for Trial of Offences under S.Cs and S.Ts. (POA) Act- cum-V Additional Sessions Judge, Nellore, wherein and whereby the Court has slightly reduced the sentence of imprisonment from three years to two years for the charge under Section 498-A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (for brevity ‘the I.P.C.,’) while confirming the sentence of payment of fine of Rs.5,000/- ordered by the learned Additional Judicial Magistrate of First Class, Kovur in C.C.No.109 of 2010 vide judgment dated 09.03.2017 on the file of the learned Additional Judicial Magistrate of First Class, Kovur.

2. Heard the learned Counsel for the Petitioner and the learned Assistant Public Prosecutor.

3. Sri T.C.Krishnan, learned Counsel for the Petitioner awhile reiterating the grounds of the Revision submits that the Petitioner/Accused No.1 was in the judicial custody for a period of one week during trial and one week during appeal period. In total, he was in the judicial custody for a period of fourteen days. The marriage of the Petitioner with de-facto complainant was performed in the year 2008. In the year 2009, the Petitioner and the de-facto complainant was blessed with one daughter, who is not at the edge of her majority. The Petitioner has been working as typist in BSNL Telephone Exchange. PW.1/de- facto complainant is M.Sc. B.Ed., holder and she is working as a teacher. 3 Nearly from 2009 onwards the Petitioner and the de-facto complainant have been residing separately. Except the Petitioner/Accused No.1 rest of the accused were acquitted by the learned Trial Court.

4. Alternatively, learned Counsel for the Petitioner submits that the sentence of imprisonment of two years may be modified to additional fine of Rs.50,000/- as a measure of penance, inasmuch as the Petitioner has already undergone judicial custody for a period of fourteen days. This additional fine amount may be excluded from the fine amount already paid by the Petitioner and urged to dispose of the Criminal Revision Case in the interest of the justice as the right to get speedy trail of the petitioner is being frustrated.

5. Per contra, Mr. P.Sandeep, learned Assistant Public Prosecutor vehemently argued that the learned Appellate Court having gone through the evidence of the prosecution witnesses and the judgment of the learned Trial Court rightly passed the judgment confirming the conviction for the offence charged and urged to dismiss the revision case as there are no material irregularities, flagrant miscarriage of justice and misreading of the evidence.

6. Thoughtful consideration is bestowed on the arguments advanced by the learned Counsel for both sides. I have perused the entire record.

7. Now the point for consideration is: “Whether the order in Crl.A.No.21 of 2020 dated 02.01.2020, passed by the learned Special Judge for Trial of Offences under S.Cs and S.Ts. (POA) Act-cum-V Additional Sessions Judge, Nellore, is correct, legal, and proper with respect to its finding, sentence, or judgment, and there are any material irregularities? And to what relief?” 4

8. In adjudicating a Criminal Revision assailing concurrent findings of conviction, it is jurisprudentially imperative to advert to the decisions of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in Bindeshwari Prasad Singh v. State of Bihar1, wherein the Court, at Paragraph 13, emphatically delineated the contours of revisional jurisdiction. It was observed that in the absence of demonstrable legal infirmity in the procedural framework or in the conduct of the trial, the High Court is bereft of justification to exercise its revisional powers. The Hon’ble Apex Court underscored that revisional authority is not a forum for re- appreciation or re-evaluation of evidence with a view to supplant the findings of the Trial Court. Only where there exists manifest illegality or palpable perversity culminating in grave miscarriage of justice, can the extraordinary jurisdiction under revision be legitimately invoked, otherwise, judicial restraint must prevail.

9. In the context of revisional scrutiny over concurrent findings of conviction, the Hon’ble Supreme Court in State of Karnataka v. Appa Babu Ingale 2 , at Paragraph No.2, has categorically circumscribed the ambit of interference by the High Court. The Court observed that ordinarily it is impermissible for the revisional Court to unsettle concurrent determinations of fact rendered by the subordinate Courts, particularly by embarking upon a re-appreciation of evidence. The revisional jurisdiction, being supervisory in nature, is not intended to function as a second appellate forum, its invocation is justified only where glaring illegality, perversity, or miscarriage