Baldev Singh v. State of Punjab (2011): Blurring the category of 'Special and Adequate Reasons'

The two-judge bench of the Supreme Court in Baldev Singh v. State of Punjab (The judgment can be found here) delivered the judgment which can have serious long term consequences for the criminal justice system in India. The core issue before the court, as already discussed on the blog, was whether it is appropriate to mitigate or lessen the sentence of three appellants who have been convicted for gang rape by the lower and high court. The appellant’s contention, in their affidavits, was that the ‘parties have entered into a compromise’ and now there is ‘no misunderstanding between them’.

The Supreme Court observed that the “incident is an old one” and the “parties have themselves entered into a compromise”. The learned court found this to be a reason ‘special and adequate’ enough to uphold the conviction but reduce the punishment of the appellants to the period already undergone i.e. 3.5 years. However, the court enhanced the fine under the section and directed that each of the appellant will pay a sum of Rs. 50, 000 to the victim within a period of three months.

The law of rape under the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (IPC) provides for a mandatory minimum punishment of seven years on conviction in any case of rape. Further, after the 1983 amendments to the Code, which happened in the wake of tragic Mathura rape case, there is another category of aggravated forms of rape that has been added under clause (2) of section 376 wherein the mandatory minimum punishment has been enhanced to be 10 years and fine and the punishment may go up to life imprisonment depending upon the circumstances of the case in issue. The offence of ‘gang rape’ forms the part of such aggravated form of rape under clause (g) of section 376 of IPC. Therefore, the present case falls in the category of rape wherein a maximum punishment for life can be given but a minimum sentence of ten years along with fine is mandated by the section itself.

It may further be stressed that the entire category of ‘special and adequate reasons’ is provided to the court to give lesser punishment than prescribed but the same must be done by giving 'Special and adequate reaons'(proviso to section 376). This category has been carved out so as to ensure that there may be an occasion where the court might in the interest of justice desire to give less punishment. But to ensure that this should not become a way out to destroy the very idea of mandatory minimum punishment, the legislature imposed a requirement that such cases must be exceptional ones and that's why the requirement of 'Special' as well as 'Adequate' reasons to be given for any relaxation in punishment. The scheme might be obfuscated if this category of 'special and adequate reasons' is not understood as an exceptional one. Due care and caution needs to be exercised to distinguish the cases where the proviso of ‘special and adequate reasons’ can be evoked and where it ought not to be invoked. This care must be taken by the judges as if the category of ‘special and adequate reasons’ is blurred then there will remain no meaning to the finer distinctions between the categories dexterously crafted under the IPC.

Keeping the above law in mind one finds it difficult, if not entirely fails, to comprehend the reasons that the court has given for invoking the proviso and reducing the punishment of the convicted offenders to already undergone three and a half years, instead of the minimum that is prescribed for and awarded by the high court for the offence of gang rape.

The offence of rape is a non-compoundable offence under the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 (CrPC.). This means that the law specifically disallows the parties to enter into any kind of compromise. This follows the fundamental principle of criminal jurisprudence that crime is an act which is against the society or the state. CrPC permits certain offences to be compounded if the parties decide the same. However, the offence of rape is clearly and unambiguously a non-compoundable offence.

So here we go: The Supreme Court of India in Baldev Singh is invoking the proviso and finding it 'adequate' to lessen the sentence even when the law in CrPC explicitly and in clear terms prohibits the same. Second, mere 'compromise between the parties' is taken as a 'special reason'. The judgment does not even mentions or investigates that why, and under what compelling circumstances, such compromise was effectuated? The court merely relies on the affidavit in the judgment. Will this decision not provide, for the well-off accused of rape, to somehow ensure that the victim enters into a compromise and then they may reduce the quantum of punishment for the most horrendous act committed against the integrity and autonomy of woman's body? In the days when courts write 5000 pages judgments to provide reasons for issues such as 'Whether Ram Lalla was born in Ayodhya?" all that the court finds fit to mitigate the punishment is that 'parties have compromised' without any further inquiry and merely in three pages!

Baldev Singh v. State is setting a dangerous trend that even reasons which are patently in contravention with the law of the land can be both 'adequate and special'. So the category can be used effectively to diminish punishment for rape even when the reasons are themselves illegal! Further, it relegates criminal law to a mere private dispute settlement mechanism as far as punishment is concerned. This blurs the whole category of 'special and adequate reasons'. Time and again arguments for providing death penalty to rapists are raised. No less than a revolt is necessitated against a decision where the reasons of 'compromise between parties' in a non-compoundable offence are considered sufficient to reduce the punishment to less than half of the statutorily provided mandatory minimum punishment.