PRATAP NARAIN AND ANR. Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS revision has been filed against the orders passed by Sri R.K. Sinha, Sessions Judge, Fatehpur, Under Sub -section (2) of Section 514 of the Code of Criminal Procedure.

(2.) TWO persons Panna and Shital, were convicted Under Section 397 of the IPC and sentenced to two years' rigorous imprisonment thereunder. They filed an appeal in the court of the Sessions Judge, Fatehpur, and were ordered to be released on bail subject to their executing bail bonds in the sum of Rs. 3,000/ - each with two sureties in like amounts. The two Applicants in this revision, Pratap Narain Misra and Ajodhya Prasad Misra, stood surety for Panna and on the necessary bonds having been executed, he was released from jail.

(3.) WHEN the Appellant before the Sessions Judge failed to appear on 21st March, and he decided to proceed against the sureties in connection with the same, it was necessary for him to follow the procedure prescribed Under Section 514 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Under Sub -section (1) aforesaid, whenever it is proved to the satisfaction of the Court that a bond has been forfeited, the Court has to record the grounds of such proof and it is thereafter that he can call upon any person bound by such bond to pay the penalty thereof or to show cause why it should not be paid. The Sessions Judge should have, therefore, recorded the grounds on which he thought it was proved to his satisfaction that the bond had been forfeited. Instead of giving the grounds aforesaid all what the Sessions Judge said in his order dated 21 -3 -1966, was: "Appellants are absent. Their bail bonds are forfeited". This only amounts to stating a fact that the bail bonds had been forfeited. The Sessions Judge has in addition to mentioning that fact also to show by his order that it was proved to his satisfaction and the grounds of such proof were to be recorded in writing. If the Sessions Judge had applied his mind to the provisions of Section 514 aforesaid, he would have at once realised that there was something lacking in the record, as it would have been necessary for the Sessions Judge first to look into the contents of the surety bond and then to see whether any one of the obligations which the sureties had taken upon themselves had been breached by the non -appearance of the Appellants before him. To the extent I have been able to decipher the record there is nothing to indicate that the Appellants had notice of the date fixed for the hearing of the appeal. Nor is there anything to indicate that information of the date of hearing was communicated to the Appellants in the manner it is contemplated in the surety bonds. All what the Sessions Judge did was to inform the counsel of the Appellants of the date fixed for the hearing of the appeal. This intimation of the date to the counsel of the Appellants was enough by virtue of Section 433 of the Code of Criminal Procedure for the hearing of the appeal, but information to the counsel was certainly not an information to the Appellants before the -Sessions Judge for appearance before him on the date of hearing. If it was intended that information to the counsel of the date fixed for the hearing of the appeal was enough even for the purpose of the appearance of the Appellants in the Sessions Court during the hearing of the appeal, the Sessions Judge should have seen that the surety bonds which are signed by the sureties are drafted in that manner and contained a stipulation to that effect.