A division bench of Justices AS Supehia and MR Mengdey while dealing with a criminal appeal filed by one Govindbhai Parmar, convicted for rape and robbery, noted that the evidence in the case was weak and did not inspire confidence.
The bench further noted that despite there being very weak evidence, the appellant before them – Parmar – had already spent more than 13 years in jail.
“We would like to highlight those cases, such as present one in which the convicts are convicted on the basis of inappropriate appreciation of evidence or the conviction is premised on such evidence which does not inspire any confidence or creates doubt, and the convicts have to undergo incarceration for a long period. In the present case, the convict has undergone 13 year and 01 month and 16 days of sentence,” the Court highlighted.
It further took into account the fact that another convict Virabhai Parmar had also undergone 12 years and 9 months of jail term.
“Such cases as the present one which are pending before the High Court need to be identified so that the conviction can be set aside at the earliest even if the sentence of the convicts is suspended. We request the State Government to do the needful in this regard by forming a Committee,” the bench ordered.
Though, we are not suggesting that the State may admit that the conviction is not proper, however, the State may suggest that such appeals be heard on priority basis, the bench said.
Source: Barandbench
