NEW DELHI: Taking a liberal approach in granting relief to convicts, Supreme Court has held that even a life convict can be released on bail during pendency of his appeal if he has a fair chance of getting acquitted in a higher court.Applying this principle, a bench of Justices J B Pardiwala and K V Viswanathan suspended the sentence of life imprisonment of a Tamil Nadu police officer who was convicted and sentenced in a custodial death case which allegedly took place in 1999 in Thoothukudi police station. The court granted relief after senior advocate MukulRohatgi and lawyer Anand Verma pointed out the contradiction in oral evidence of prosecution witnesses (PW).”When the court is called upon to consider the plea for suspension of a substantive order of life imprisonment, the considerations are different. In cases of fixed sentence, the appellate court may consider the plea liberally unless there are exceptional circumstances to deny suspension. When it comes to life imprisonment, the appellate court should consider whether there is anything palpable or anything on the face of the record on the basis of which it could be said that the appellant has fair chances of succeeding in his appeal and getting acquitted,” the bench said. The court said prima facie, it is of the view that the oral evidence of the PW 4 and the PW 5 respectively is in direct conflict on material aspects with the evidence of the PW 2.”The law is well settled. Conviction can be based on the evidence of a solitary eye-witness provided it is found to be wholly reliable. If it is found to be wholly unreliable, then there is no problem in discarding the entire evidence. There could be a third category wherein the court may find the evidence of a solitary eye-witness is neither wholly reliable nor wholly unreliable and in such a situation, the court must insist for corroboration in material particulars. We tried exactly to do the same thing by cursorily looking into the evidence of the PW 4 and PW 5 respectively. Prima facie, the oral evidence does not inspire confidence. In such circumstances referred to above, we are persuaded to accept the plea of the appellant for suspension of the substantive order of sentence pending the final disposal of his criminal appeal before high court,” the bench said.
