Gauhati High Court: Rumi Kumari Phukan, J. dismissed an application seeking leave to appeal against an Assistant Sessions Judge’s order of acquittal, holding that the forum for preferring such an appeal would be the Court of Sessions Judge and not the High Court.
The petitioner (herein) in the instant case alleged before the trial court that the accused persons had forcefully kidnapped his daughter while she was returning from college. She was also kept confined by them. As a result, the petitioner registered complaint under Section 366 read with Section 34 of Penal Code, 1860. Learned Assistant Sessions Judge acquitted all the accused persons. Aggrieved by this order of acquittal the petitioner preferred the present application under Section 378(3) of Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 seeking leave to file an appeal against the acquittal order.
The counsel for the petitioner, A.T. Sarkar, placed reliance upon the decision rendered in Satyapal Singh v. State of Madhya Pradesh, (2015) 15 SCC 613, while preferring appeal under 378(3) of CrPC. He contended, “even though the victim has a right to prefer an appeal against the order of acquittal u/s 372 CrPC but same can be filed only after obtaining leave of the Court as required under sub-section 3 of Section 378 CrPC.”
The Court after perusing the legal provisions and pronouncements observed, “it appears that there is a confusion in the mind of the petitioner that he has to seek for leave to prefer the appeal in view of the decision in Satypal Singh case.” It was further observed, “As the appeal sought to be preferred against the order of the learned Assistant Sessions Judge so the appeal will lie to the Court of learned Sessions Judge.” Thus, the Court taking into consideration the bona fide nature of application by quoting the provision under Section 378(3) of CrPC, opined that the petitioner was not debarred to prefer the appeal to which he was entitled under the statute. The Court held, “the petitioner herein being the informant has a right to prefer an appeal u/s 372 (proviso) CrPC and he being the informant in the GR Case he cannot be equated as complainant within the purview of Section 378 (3) of CrPC and no leave is required to prefer such appeal.”
In light of the above, the Court dismissed the instant appeal but granted him liberty to prefer an appeal in the Court of concerned Sessions Judge.[Akhtar Mirza v. State of Assam, 2019 SCC OnLine Gau 2295, decided on 14-05-2019]