DATE: 15.07.2026
COURT: Supreme Court of India
BENCH: Justice B.V. Nagarathna and Justice
R. Mahadevan
FACTS:
On 14 October 2003,
FIR No. 197 of 2003 was registered at Police Station Babri, District
Muzaffarnagar, against nine accused, including Sudesh Pal (the
applicant/appellant), under Sections 147, 148, 149, 302, 307, 452 and 323 IPC.
Charges were framed on 13 July 2005. By judgment dated 31 July 2015, the
Sessions Court convicted Sudesh Pal, Madan and Ishwar under Section 302 read
with Section 149 IPC. Sudesh Pal and Madan were sentenced to death with a fine
of ₹50,000 each, while Ishwar was sentenced to life imprisonment.
The High Court of
Allahabad, by judgment dated 22 February 2017, partly allowed Sudesh Pal’s
appeal, converting his death sentence to life imprisonment, while upholding
Madan’s death sentence and Ishwar’s life sentence. In a common judgment dated 9
November 2023, the Supreme Court dismissed Sudesh Pal’s appeal and confirmed
his life imprisonment; in Madan’s appeal it converted the death penalty to a
fixed term of twenty years’ imprisonment without remission. Having completed
that term, Madan was released. Sudesh Pal thereafter filed the present
Miscellaneous Application seeking modification of his life sentence to a fixed
term of twenty years on the grounds of prolonged incarceration (over
twenty-four years with remission), old age, good conduct and parity with Madan.
ISSUES:
The principal issue
was whether the principle of parity required that Sudesh Pal’s sentence of life
imprisonment be modified to a fixed term of twenty years (the sentence
ultimately imposed on co-accused Madan) so that he too could be released after
having already undergone more than twenty-four years of imprisonment with
remission.
JUDGEMENT WITH REASONING:
The Supreme Court
allowed the Miscellaneous Application. Applying the principle of parity, it
directed that Sudesh Pal’s sentence stand restricted to a fixed term of twenty
years and ordered his immediate release, since he had already completed more
than twenty years of imprisonment with remission. Pending applications were
disposed of.
Both Sudesh Pal and
Madan had originally been sentenced to death by the Trial Court. The High Court
had already shown relative leniency to Sudesh Pal by commuting his death
sentence to life imprisonment, while sustaining the death penalty against
Madan. When the Supreme Court later reduced Madan’s sentence to a fixed term of
twenty years without remission (leading to his release), the disparity in the
ultimate sentences became stark. The Court held that the principle of parity
must govern the nature of the punishment imposed on similarly situated
co-accused. Since Sudesh Pal had never been under a death sentence at the
Supreme Court stage and had already received the benefit of commutation to life
imprisonment, justice required that his sentence also be confined to the same
fixed term of twenty years that had been granted to Madan.
The Court noted that
Sudesh Pal had already undergone more than twenty-four years of imprisonment
with remission well beyond the twenty-year period fixed for Madan. The State’s
contention that Madan’s fixed-term sentence was granted solely on medical
grounds was not accepted as a ground to deny parity. Having regard to the
length of incarceration already suffered, the parity of treatment demanded by
the identical original charges and the earlier appellate history, the Court
concluded that the ends of justice would be met by directing Sudesh Pal’s
immediate release. The Miscellaneous Application was accordingly allowed.
ANALYSIS:
This decision
illustrates the Supreme Court’s readiness to invoke the principle of parity
even at the post-conviction stage through a miscellaneous application, in order
to correct an anomalous disparity that had arisen between similarly situated
co-accused. Although Sudesh Pal’s death sentence had already been commuted to
life imprisonment by the High Court (and confirmed by the Supreme Court in
2023), the subsequent reduction of co-accused Madan’s death sentence to a fixed
term of twenty years without remission created a stark imbalance. By treating
the length and nature of the ultimate sentence as the relevant point of
comparison rather than the intermediate appellate history or the State’s claim
that Madan’s relief rested solely on medical grounds, the Court reaffirmed that
parity is a substantive facet of equal treatment under Article 14 and of the
individualized yet consistent administration of criminal justice. The ruling
thereby prevents the fortuitous order in which appeals are decided from producing
unequal outcomes for persons who stood on identical footing at the trial stage.
The judgment also
reflects a pragmatic sensitivity to prolonged incarceration. Having already
undergone more than twenty-four years with remission well beyond the
twenty-year term fixed for Madan, Sudesh Pal’s continued detention would have
served no legitimate penological purpose. The Court’s direction for immediate
release underscores that once the outer limit of a comparable fixed-term
sentence has been crossed, the residual life sentence loses its justification
on grounds of parity and fairness. In this sense the decision joins a growing
line of authorities that treat excessive delay and differential treatment of
co-accused as independent grounds for sentence modification, thereby tempering
the rigidity of life imprisonment with considerations of equity, rehabilitation
and the practical realities of long-term imprisonment.
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