BALDEV RAJ Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner Baldev Raj, who was stated to be a boy of 20 years age by the Courts below, was con- victed on 14th; May, 1968 by a learned Magistrate 1st Class, Delhi, under section 324, Indian Penal Code and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for one year. The Charge against him was that he had stabbed one Satish Chander on 20th July, 1967 at about 9.15A.M. when the injured person was going for a walk via T. B. Hospital Kingsway Camp along with Inderjit. Two injuries were given with the knife by the accused, one at the back of the neck and the other somewhere on the left arm. The conviction was upheld by the learned Additional Sessions Judge but the sentence was reduced to rigorous imprisonment for six months. The order of the learned Additional Sessions Judge is dated 7th October, 1968 and it was directed that the accused, who was on bail, be taken in custody.

(2.) Both the Courts below considered the question of releasing the accused under the Probation of Offenders Act, but they could not per- suade themselves to give the protection of this Act to the accused. The learned Magistrate disposed of this part of the case in the following words :-

(3.) In this Court, the learned counsel for the accused-petitioner .has advisedly not taken me through the evidence and has abstained from challenging the conviction and the sentence on the merits. He has con- fined himself only to the question of the benefit of the Probation .of Offenders Act 20 of 1958. The main grievance which he has -attempted to make out is that the report called for by the learned Magistrate from the Probation Officer should have been disclosed to the accused so as to enable him to rebut the opinion of the said officer. According to him, he has a right to know what the Probation Officer thinks about him so as to rectify any error in which the Probation Officer may have fallen in his enquiry about the conduct or the behaviour of the accused.