Can life sentence be 'rigorous'? SC to consider
NEW DELHI: Can the word ‘rigorous’ be added by courts when they award life imprisonment? The Supreme Court has agreed to examine the question whether courts are statutorily empowered to make life
imprisonments tougher for convicts by adding “rigorous” (harsh) to life sentence as the law does not provide for this.
A Bench headed by Justice P C Ghose made the observation, while hearing a plea which said that neither is there a penal provision that dealt with the offence of murder, nor the code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), provide that the term ‘rigorous’ can be included by courts while awarding life sentences to convicts.
The court was hearing a plea by a convict called Ram Kumar Sivare, who has been awarded rigorous life term in a murder case and who has contended that the judgment pronounced by the courts below was
unconstitutional and ultra-vires as penal and procedural laws do not empower them to qualify life sentence with the term ‘rigorous’.
“Let notice be issued in the matter limited to the question whether life imprisonment could be coupled with the condition that such imprisonment has to be rigorous imprisonment, returnable after four weeks,” said the SC Bench, also comprising Justice U U Lalit. The court has issued the notice to the State of
Chhattisgarh.
“The award of rigorous life imprisonment by the lower court and the Chhattisgarh High Court is violative of Article 21 (protection of life and liberty) and 14 (right to equality) of the Constitution,” said the plea.
In cases of rigorous imprisonment, convicts are required to work in prisons as per prison manual guidelines. Section 53 of the Indian Penal Code specifies punishments to which offenders are liable
under the Code. Under the section, rigorous imprisonment is termed as imprisonment with “hard labour”. However, imprisonment for life is a separate category according to Section 53 and it is not qualified by terms like “simple” or “rigorous”.
The apex court was hearing the appeal filed by Sivare, who is serving rigorous life term in a Chhattisgarh jail, challenging the High Court verdict in a murder case.
The High Court had upheld the trial court judgment convicting and awarding life term to Sivare and Bhuneshwar Prasad for stabbing to death a person called Anil Bhoyar on January 5, 2010, near a government hospital in Durg district of Chhattisgarh following a tiff over a minor issue. The trial court had acquitted the third accused Manoj, which was upheld by the High Court.