MADAN BAGDI Vs. STATE
LAWS(CAL)-1966-2-17
HIGH COURT OF CALCUTTA
Decided on February 02,1966

MADAN BAGDI Appellant
VERSUS
STATE OF WEST BENGAL Respondents


Referred Judgements :-

RABARI CHELA JADAV VS. STATE OF BOMBAY [REFERRED TO]
LALU JELA VS. STATE OF GUJARAT [REFERRED TO]


JUDGEMENT

B.N.Dutt, J. - (1.)Nine persons were convicted by an Assistant Sessions Judge at Birbhum under Section 395 of the Indian Penal Code and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for three years each. Six of them preferred an appeal before the Sessions Judge of Birbhum. They filed a joint petition of appeal. This appeal was heard by an Additional Sessions Judge. He dismissed the appeal on the preliminary point that a joint petition of appeal by more than one convicted person was not maintainable in law The petitioners were three out of the said six appellants The petitioners have obtained this Rule against the aforesaid order of the Additional Sessions Judge.
(2.)The short question for consideration is if a joint petition of appeal by more than one convicted pennon is maintainable under Section 419 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The relevant portion of Section 419 is as follows: "Every appeal shall be made in the form of a petition in writing presented by the appellant or his pleader" Does this mean that when several persons are convicted at a joint trial each one must file a separate petition of appeal or more than one such person can join in one petition of appeal? What Section 419 contemplates is that an appeal shall be in the form of a petition in writing It does not say that each appellant must file a separate petition in writing or in other words, the words in Section 419 do not bar more than one convicted person to join in one petition.
(3.)It has been argued that if more than one convicted person join in one petition of appeal. Sections 421 and 431 of the Code would become unworkable Section 421 reads as follows
"On receiving the petition... under Section 419... the Appellate Court shall peruse the same. and. if it considers that there is no sufficient ground for interfering it may dismiss the appeal summarily."
It is said that if more than one person join in one petition of appeal, the Appellate Court will not be in a position to summarily dismiss the appeal in respect of one of the appellants even though it considers that there is no sufficient ground for interfering as against him There can be no substance in this contention. When more than one convicted person files a joint petition of appeal there will be no difficult in proceeding under Section 421 of the Code inasmuch as if the Appellate Court thinks that the appeal in respect of one of the appellants has no substance it can record an order that the appeal of that appellant would stand summarily dismissed and the appeal of the other appellants would proceed But to this it has been argued that that would mean partial summary dismissal of an appeal which would be bad in law Reference is in this connection made to the Supreme Court decision Babri Ghela Jadav v. State of Bombay reported in AIR 1960 SC 746. But that was a case of an appeal filed by one person. What was held there was that the Appellate Court could not in exercise of its powers under Section 421 of the Code direct that the appeal should be heard only on the point of sentence. The Appellate Court in that case summarily dismissed the appeal as regards the conviction of the appellant but admitted the appeal on the question of sentence What the Supreme Court said was that the Appellate Court had power to dismiss the entire appeal summarily if it considers that there was no sufficient ground for interfering But it had no power to direct that the appeal should be heard only on the point of sentence Thus what was held by the Supreme Court was that when there was an appeal by one appellant there can be no partial summary dismissal of the appeal under Section 421 of the Code. The Supreme Court had not to consider in that case if the Appellate Court in exercise of the powers under Section 421 of the Code can summarily dismiss the appeal in respect of one person and proceed with the appeal in respect of the other persons where more than one person have filed a joint petition of appeal When more than one person file a joint petition of appeal and when the Appellate Court summarily dismissed the appeal of one of them this does not amount to a partial summary dismissal of the appeal within the terms of the aforesaid Supreme Court decision because the whole appeal in respect of that appellant is dismissed.


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