NEW DELHI: A man has been barred from driving any vehicle for his entire life by a Delhi court as a stern punishment for rashly driving a truck, crushing to death a nine-year-old boy in 2000. The court ordered cancellation of the driving licence of Sunil Kumar Mishra, a resident of Pratapgarh in Uttar Pradesh, and said no fresh licence should be issued to him as he is barred from obtaining it "throughout his life".
The court said the order be circulated to all registration authorities across the country. Besides this, the convict was sent to jail for one year for causing the death of the schoolgoing child by negligence. "It is ordered that the driving licence of Mishra shall also stand cancelled and if placed on record be destroyed. Also an information be sent to the concerned MLO, Registration Authority for cancellation of his licence on record to enter an entry to that effect that his licence is cancelled and he is barred to obtain any driving licence throughout his life and no fresh driving licence shall be issued to him," Additional Sessions Judge Archana Sinha said.
The only concession for the errant driver was that the sessions judge reduced his 18 months jail term ordered by a magistrate to one year, considering his poor financial condition, that he has to support four children and has been facing trial for 17 years. "The sentence awarded to him (by magistrate) needs reconsideration and review to create a balance between victim -oriented-justice and accused-oriented-justice, thus the order on sentence is modified..," the judge said.
According to the prosection, the incident took place on August 31, 2000 in front of DAV school in Samaipur Badli here when Mishra was driving a truck trailor in rash and negligent manner and hit the boy, Naveen Kumar, from behind, causing his death. Naveen was walking with his father to school. The driver had claimed in his appeal that the prosecution had failed to prove by which vehicle the accident was caused and as the place of incident was a crowded area near a school, the vehicle could not have been driven at a high speed. There was no evidence to prove that he was driving the truck in a rash and negligent manner, he had argued.
"In such a case where the complainant (father) himself suffered such a trauma, in which his life was luckily saved and he had witnessed the accident in which his minor son who was in his company at that time of accident had died in such a bitter and miserable condition, truthfulness of the witness and his credibility cannot be disbelieved, just for the reason that he was the father," the court said.