The Supreme Court in a significant decision has held that offenders of heinous crimes who are punished with sentences varying from fixed term to life, will have to first complete their term sentence and then undergo punishment for life.
This direction by a Constitution Bench came while examining the question on whether trial courts can award two life terms to a single offender accused of multiple murders or such heinous crimes punishable with maximum sentence of life.
Answering this question, the Bench of Chief Justice TS Thakur, Justices FM Ibrahim Kalifulla, AK Sikri, SA Bobde and R Banumathi said, “Any direction that requires the offender to undergo imprisonment for life twice over would be anomalous and irrational for it will disregard the fact that humans like all other living beings have but one life to live.”
In such a scenario, the Bench said that the two life terms will run concurrent and not consecutive, ie one after the other. However, the Bench added that any remission or pardon granted against one life term will not have any effect on the other life term suffered by the convict. This would mean that any life convict will have to secure separate pardon from the State Government under the Criminal Procedure Code separately for each of the life term punishments he or she is undergoing.
The Bench then examined the scope of a convict who is punished with sentence of varying terms for multiple heinous offences in a single case which may include a single life term. In this scenario, the Bench observed, “The (trial) court can legitimately direct that the prisoner shall first undergo the term sentence before the commencement of his life sentence. Such a direction shall be perfectly legitimate and in tune with Section 31 of CrPC.”
The converse, however, may not be true for if the court directs the life sentence to start first it would necessarily imply that the term sentence would run concurrently. That is because once the prisoner spends his life in jail, there is no question of his undergoing any further sentence, added Chief Justice TS Thakur, who wrote the judgment for the Bench.