The exultation over speedy justice after a trial court here sentenced the four convicts in Dec 16, 2012 gang-rape to death may turn out to be short-lived as the journey of the case through the higher judiciary may, even if speeded up, take at least an year, jurists and legal experts say.
Even if the Delhi High Court, taking into account the public interest this case has generated, decides to expedite it when the death reference comes before it for reconfirmation, it would take about three to four months before it decides either way.
The high court, says the former Patna High Court chief justice Nagendra Rai, "has to examine the entire case de novo, go through every material on record and independently apply its mind before coming to a conclusion whether it was a fit case for confirming the death reference."
The consideration of death reference will get "primacy" over all other cases and it is a duty cast upon the high court to visit the case in its entirety, he said, adding that the court had to take into account the seriousness of the crime.
"Not many death references are pending before the high court and as and when death reference come before the court, it is decided as quickly and urgently as possible. All judges are aware of it and there are no unnecessary delays," Rupinder Singh Sodhi, a senior Supreme Court counsel who is a former judge of the Delhi High Court, told IANS.
Sodhi, who had awarded the death sentence to Santosh Kumar Singh who was convicted for the rape and murder of his Delhi Law Faculty junior Priyadarshini Matoo, said that in case the Delhi High Court confirms the death reference, the four convicts will have 90 days' time to appeal to the apex court.
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(The trial court had sentenced Santosh Kumar Singh to life imprisonment, Sodhi had enhanced this to death and the Supreme Court had commuted this to life.)
The apex court, in turn, may take two to three months to decide on the appeal, Sodhi said, adding it be would nearly a year before the case completes its scrutiny by the higher judiciary and attains finality.
While hearing the matter, "nobody wants to be unfair to them and rush through the proceedings without giving them ample an opportunity (to present their point of view)," and the mandate of law has to be respected, he maintained.
Jaspal Singh, another senior apex court counsel and former Delhi High Court judge, told IANS: "My reading is that the high court will take it out of turn. So will the Supreme Court, keeping in view the public opinion... otherwise it takes years."
Notwithstanding public opinion, Jaspal Singh, outlining the procedure, agreed with Rai and Sodhi, saying it "will take around one year" till the case is decided one way or the other by the two courts of appeal.
If that happens, it would be a case of the justice delivery system moving at an exceptional pace as in the Naina Sahni murder case, which came to be known as Tandoor Case, the apex court had, on Aug 13, reserved its order on the plea of Sushil Sharma, who had challenged the Delhi High Court upholding his death sentence.
Sahni was killed on Nov 2, 1995 by her husband Sushil Sharma, then a Youth Congress leader. He was convicted and sentenced to death by a trial court on Nov 7, 2003, which Delhi High Court upheld Feb 19, 2007.
In the Dec 16, 2012 case, a 23-year-old woman was brutally gang-raped in a moving bus by six people, including a juvenile. She died of her grave intestinal injuries Dec 29 at Singapore's Mount Elizabeth Hospital, where she had been airlifted for specialised treatment.
A fast-track court pronounced its sentence on the four convicts Friday to loud cheers from the large crowds that had gathered outside.
Of the original six accused, one was a juvenile and has been sent to a remand home for three years, the maximum sentence permissible under the law. One accused was found dead in his Tihar Jail cell.
(Parmod Kumar can be contacted at saneel2010@gmail.com)