Trial courts can't extend 'life term' to 'life in jail': Supreme Court

New Delhi, March 6

A trial court while sentencing an accused to life imprisonment cannot order that such imprisonment is for the remainder of natural life, the Supreme Court reiterated.

A Bench led by Justice Ajay Rastogi modified the life term extending to the remainder of the natural life of convict Narendra Singh awarded by a Rajasthan trial court and confirmed by the HC to a simple life imprisonment. “After we have heard the learned Counsel for the parties and taking note of the Constitution Bench judgment of this court (in V Sriharan’s case) reported in 2016…, the sentence of life imprisonment which shall be extended to remainder of life passed by the learned trial court by judgment dated December 19, 2013, and confirmed by the HC on dismissal of appeal stands modified with the sentence for imprisonment for life,” said the Bench in its February 28 order.

In Sriharan’s case, a Constitution Bench had ruled that the power to impose a modified punishment providing for any specific jail term or imprisonment till the end of the convict’s life as an alternate to death penalty, can be exercised only by the HC and SC and not by any other court. —