BENGALURU: Striking down a special court’s order, the Karnataka High Court increased the jail term from five years to seven years for an accused under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Pocso) Act. The high court said that the special court doesn’t have the power to reduce the minimum sentence prescribed in the statute.
Justice V Srishananda passed the order while allowing an appeal filed by the state government which questioned the order passed by the special court. In 2015, the special court had sentenced accused Shaik Rouf of Bhalki taluk in Bidar district to five years imprisonment instead of imposing a minimum of seven years of punishment.
“It is a settled principle of law and requires no emphasis that when a statute prescribes minimum sentence, the trial judge or the appellate judge has no discretion whatsoever to reduce the minimum sentence prescribed by the statute”, the high court observed.
“The accused shall surrender before the special court on or before January 31, 2023. In the event of the accused failing to surrender to serve the balance period of sentence, the special court is at liberty to issue a modified conviction warrant and secure the presence of the accused for serving the remaining part of the sentence”, the high court said in its order passed recently. The accused was chargesheeted for an offence punishable under Section 376 of IPC and Section 4 of the Act. The special court sentenced the accused to undergo simple imprisonment for five years and imposed a fine of Rs 2,000 and said both sentences should run concurrently.
Aggrieved by the order, the State Government filed an appeal before the high court, contending that the approach of the special court in sentencing the accused for five years is illegal.