MEDICHETTY RAMAKISTIAH Vs. STATE OF ANDHRA PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These appeals arise out of Sessions Case No. 11/8 of 1958 on the file of the Sessions Judge, Khammam division. As two of the appellants have been sentenced to death, the sentences have been submitted to us by that Court for confirmation. We have not heard these appeals on the merits because in our opinion, an objection taken by the learned counsel for the appellants as to the manner in which the trial was conducted must prevail and there should be a retrial of the case.

(2.) We may state however that our decision to direct a re-trial has not been reached without reluctance. A re-trial does not only involve fresh expenditure of public time and money; it also occasions considerable hardship to the accused by prolonging the period of uncertainty as to their fate and entailing, at least in cases where they retain counsel of their own, extra expenditure of money for them too. There will be, besides, considerable inconvenience caused to the witnesses, an inconvenience so graphically described by Bose J., in Sangram Singh v. Election Tribunal, 1955 SCJ 431 at p. 439: ((S) AIR 1955 SC 425 at p. 432). Fully aware as we are of these undesirable consequences, we need hardly state that we are ordering a re-trial of the case because we are convinced that it is the only course to adopt in the interests of justice.

(3.) Mr. Chinnappa Reddys objection shortly stated is that contrary to the relevant provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the Public Prosecutor abdicated his duty to conduct the prosecution and that a pleader, privately briefed and instructed, took complete charge of the case and effectively determined its course and that, as a consequence, there was grave prejudice to the appellants. It is frankly conceded by him that no objection to the procedure adopted was taken by his clients in the trial Court.