# 844 NETI SREERAMULU v. STATE OF ANDHRA PRADESH

- **Citation:** [1973] 3 S.C.R. 844
- **Court:** Supreme Court of India
- **Decided:** 1973-04-02
- **Case number:** Criminal Appeal No. so of 1973
- **Bench:** Mathew, J. D. Dua
- **Source:** https://unisonlegal.in/judgment/supreme-court-of-india/844-neti-sreeramulu-v-state-of-andhra-pradesh-5958
- **Pages:** 6

## Headnote

Indian Pane! Code, s. 302-Accused convicted for murder-Whether
ientence .to be reduced from death to life imprisonment.
Appellant, aged 20, was convicted and sentenced to death for murdering hJS wife on October 30, 1971 and the High Court confirmed the death
sentence on January 24, 1972. The appeal tu this Court was limited only
to the question of sentence.
Jn the High Court it was argued that the sentence should be reduced
to Iife imprisonment because, the appellant was a young man of 20 years
of age, the iilcident arose out of sexual jealousy and the crime was not
pre-meditated'.
The High Court did not consider these circumstances to
be sufficient to merit a lesser sentence.
Jn this Court it was contended that appellant acted under grave provocation and secondly, the Courts below had ignored the effect of the
recent amendment of s. 357 Cr.P.C.
Allowing the appeal,
HELD : (I) While confirming the capital sentence, the High Court
has an obligation to itself to consider why sentence should be imposed
and should not be content with the trial cburt's decision on the point.
It
is the duty di the High .Court to consider the proceedings in all their
aspects and come to an independent conclusion on the materials, apart
from the view ·expressed by the Sessions Judge.
In so doing, the
High
Court will be assisted by the opinian expressed by the Sessions Judge but
the Jaw requires that the High Court should come to an independent conclusion of its own.
[847EJ
Jumman & others v. The State of Punjab, A.I.R. 1957 S.C. 469, referred tn.,
(ii) In the present case, assuming the trial court was justified in imposing the capital sentence, the Jong lapse of time since the imposition
of the capital sentence by the trial Court and the consideration of the
question by tihs Court, constitutes a relevant ground for
reducing
the
sentence to 1ife imprisonment. The appellant must have been in the condemned cell ever since
the death penalty
was imposed on him.
The
appellant must have been subjected to acute mental agony ever since the
death penalty was imposed on him. Therefore, the sentence of capital
punishment must be reduced to life imprisonment in the
present
case.
[848C]
.
In Piare Dusadh & Others v. Emperor A.LR. 1944 F.C. 1, the sentence
of death was reduced to one of transportation for li'fe when the convict
had inter alia, been awaiting execution of death senten~e for over a year.

## Text

.844
NETI SREERAMULU
v.
STATE OF ANDHRA PRADESH
April 2, 1973
[K. K, MATHEW AND J. D. DUA, JJ.J
Indian Pane! Code, s. 302-Accused convicted for murder-Whether
ientence .to be reduced from death to life imprisonment.
Appellant, aged 20, was convicted and sentenced to death for murdering hJS wife on October 30, 1971 and the High Court confirmed the death
sentence on January 24, 1972. The appeal tu this Court was limited only
to the question of sentence.
Jn the High Court it was argued that the sentence should be reduced
to Iife imprisonment because, the appellant was a young man of 20 years
of age, the iilcident arose out of sexual jealousy and the crime was not
pre-meditated'.
The High Court did not consider these circumstances to
be sufficient to merit a lesser sentence.
Jn this Court it was contended that appellant acted under grave provocation and secondly, the Courts below had ignored the effect of the
recent amendment of s. 357 Cr.P.C.
Allowing the appeal,
HELD : (I) While confirming the capital sentence, the High Court
has an obligation to itself to consider why sentence should be imposed
and should not be content with the trial cburt's decision on the point.
It
is the duty di the High .Court to consider the proceedings in all their
aspects and come to an independent conclusion on the materials, apart
from the view ·expressed by the Sessions Judge.
In so doing, the
High
Court will be assisted by the opinian expressed by the Sessions Judge but
the Jaw requires that the High Court should come to an independent conclusion of its own.
[847EJ
Jumman & others v. The State of Punjab, A.I.R. 1957 S.C. 469, referred tn.,
(ii) In the present case, assuming the trial court was justified in imposing the capital sentence, the Jong lapse of time since the imposition
of the capital sentence by the trial Court and the consideration of the
question by tihs Court, constitutes a relevant ground for
reducing
the
sentence to 1ife imprisonment. The appellant must have been in the condemned cell ever since
the death penalty
was imposed on him.
The
appellant must have been subjected to acute mental agony ever since the
death penalty was imposed on him. Therefore, the sentence of capital
punishment must be reduced to life imprisonment in the
present
case.
[848C]
.
In Piare Dusadh & Others v. Emperor A.LR. 1944 F.C. 1, the sentence
of death was reduced to one of transportation for li'fe when the convict
had inter alia, been awaiting execution of death senten~e for over a year.
CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Criminal Appeal No. so
of 1973.
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NET! SREERAMULU v. A. P. STATE (Dua, J.)
845
Appeal by special leave from the judgment and order dated
January 24, 1972 of. the Andhra Pradesh High Court in Cr. A.
No. 796 of 1971 and Referred Trial No. 9 of 1971.
0. P. Rana, for the appellant.
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by
DuA, J.-In this appeal from the judgment and order of the
Andhra Pradesh High Court convicting the
appellant for the
murder of one Gadusula Seetha under s. 302, I.P.C. and sentencing him to death, special leave granted by this Court was limited
only to the question of sentence. The preparation of the record
was dispensed with and the appeal was directed to be heard on
the S.L.P. paper book. In the order granting ·special leave dated
March 1, 1973 it was specifically directed as under :
"Let an actual date of hearing of the appi;al be fixed
·which will not be longer than one month from today,
and notice of the actual date of hearing oi the appeal
shall be sen1 to the respondent forthwith."
Earlier, on July 5, 1972 the ·special leave petition .has been placed
before the vacation Judge (K. K. Mathew J) and
notice was
directed to go to the respondent to show cause why special leave
should not be granted in regard to the sentence only. It is unfortunate that the matter could not be placed before the Bench
after service of show cause notice for nearly eight months. The
appellant had been sentenced to death as far ~ck as October 30,
1971 by the Additional Sessions Judge, West Godavari Division
at Eluru and the death sentence was confirmed by the High Court
on January 24, 1972.
The prosecution story as upheld by the High Court stated
briefly is that the deceased, who was a married woman, was having
an illicit intimacy with the appellant and they were both living
;at Tadimalla.
Before they came to Tadmalla to settle down
there, the deceased was married to one Basavaiah of Eythapuram,
There, she had developed illicit
intimacy with her husband's
brother and is stated to have eloped with him.
Sometime later,
G .she patched up with her husband and they both then went down
tto Tadimalla to live. there, which was the native village of the
·deceased.
But there also the deceased developed illicit intimacy
with the appellant who belonged to Harijan community.
Apparently the deceased belonged to a higher caste. It appears that
H
the appellant and the deceased started living together in a portion
of the appellant's house in Harijanwada of Tadimalla village.
According to the testimony of Osha Tharmaiah (P.W. 14) even
·when the deceased was living with the appellant she was having a
liaison with this witness.
The deceased met with her death on
846
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
[19731 3 s.c.R.
April 24, 1971 at about 6 a.m. About 20 days prior to this date,
the deceased left the appellant's house and started Jiving in a
portion of the house of Gapapati Bapanamma (P.W. 13), the
maternal grandmother of Osha Thammaiah (P.W. 14). According to P.W. 14 the deceased did so in order to continue her illicit
intimacy with that witness.
The appellant apparently felt distressed on account of this conduct on the part of the deceased.
On 1he morning c.f April 14, 1971, the deceased went to the
Panchayat well to take water to her house and while she was
standing there on the platform of the well, the appellant went
there, caught hold of her pig-tail from behind with his left hand
and delivered two blows on the left side of her neck and gave two
or three .blows on ·her left upper fore-arm. The deceased tried to
free herself from the appellant's grip but fell down flat about six
yards away from the well. The appellant is said to have delivered
another blow with the knife on the left side of her abdomen which
resulted in her intestines protruding out. The deceased it a11pears
died soon after the receipt of these injuries.
In the High Court on behalf of the .appellant it was argued
that the sentence should be reduced to life imprisonment because :
( 1) the appellant is a very young man of about 20 years of age;
( 2) the incident arose out of sexual jealously and ( 3) 6e crime
was not pre-meditated.
The High Court did not consider these
circumstances to be sufficient to merit a lesser sentence, because
from the evidence of the doctor and the postmortem certificate
given b~ him it was evident that the a11pellant had inflicted as
many as ten incised injuries out of which two injuries were fatal
and even after inflicting the injuries on the deceased indiscriminately the appellant stabbed her in the abdomen with such violence that the intestines actually came out and this happened
after the deceased had fallen down. From the injuries caused by
the appellant to the deceased the High Court felt that the accused
must have
intended
to
murder
her
and his intention
in
attacking the deceased was· only to chastise her or to teach her a
lesson. Finding no reason to reduce the sentence passed by the
trial court the High Court confirmed the capital sentence.
In this Court it was contended on behalf of the appellant that
there was grave provocation for the appellant in that the appellant
had sacrified everything for the sake of keeping the deceased with
him but she had proved unfaithful and had not only started living
with someone else but had even ridiculed him. It was also con·
tended that the courts below had completely ignored the effect
of the recent amendment of s.357, Cr. P.C. and that they have
proceeded as if there must be some mitigating circumstance in
order to justify the imposition of a lesser penalty in case of con·
viction under s. 302, 1.P .C.
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NET! SREERAMULU v. A. P. STATE (Dua,!.)
847
'f!le learned additional Sessions Judge, when dealing with the
quest1<;n of. sentence observed that there were "absolutely no extenuatmg circumstances to justify imposition of lesser sentence".
No doubt, according to the trial court the murder was committed
in btoad day-light in the presence of ~any persons in the heart of
the Harijanwada and nothing had transpired on the day of the
occurrence which could have conceivably given any provocation
to. the appellant so as to incite him to commit the offence and the
murder was committed in cold blood with pre-meditation. But it
does appear to us that the learned additional Sessions Judge was
perhaps not fully conscious of the amendment and his approach
suggests that he was looking for some mitigating circumstance to
just~fy the imposition of lesser penalty. Having found none, the
capital sentence was imposed.
In the High Court also when the question of sentence was
raised it was observed as follows :
"It is clear !hat the accused intended to murder the
deceased.
We do not find any reason to reduce the
sentence passed by the lower court.
We confirm the
.sentence."
While confirming the capital sentence the High Court had quite
clearly an obligation to itself c~:msider what sentence should b<i
imposed and not be content with the trial court's decision on the
point unless some reason was shown for reducing that sentence~
As observed in Jumman & others v. The State of Punjab('),
in such a case, "it is the duty of the High Court to consider the
proceedings in all their aspects and come to an independent con-·
clusion on the materials, apart from the view expressed by the
Sessions Judge. In so doing, the High Court will be assisted by
the opinion expressed by the Sessions Judge, but under the provisions of the law above-mentioned it is for the High Court to
ccme to an independent conclusion of its own."
No doubt, as observed by the High Court, tbere were as many
as ten incised injuries on the deceased and injuries nos. 1 and 4
were considered by the medical evidence to be fatal. It is also
clear that on the. day of the incident nothing had. happened to
cause sudden provocation which should be grave enough to make
the appellant lose his balance of mind. But in that case an argument would be open to take the offence out of the purview of
ss. 300 and 302, I.P.C. That point does not appear to be open
to the appellant because this appeal was not admitted. on the
merits and we are only required to consider whether on the conclusions of the High Court and on the assumption that the offence
(1) A. I. R. 1957 S. C. 469.
843
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
[1973] 3 S.C.R.
is one of murder, lesser penalty should be imposed in the pre,ent
case. Apart from the question of what sentence should have been
imposed by the trial court, in our opinion, it is open to this Court
under Art. 136 of the Constitution to see what sentence pennissible under the law would meet the ends of .iustice now when we
are called upon to consider that question.
The appellant was
clearly on terms of improper intimacy with the deceased and was
perhaps overcome by a sense of jealousy or indignation of what
he thought was unfaithfulness on the part of the deceased, Assuming the trial court was justified in imposing the capital sentence,
the long lapse of time since the imposition of the capital sentence
by the trial court and the consideration of the question of sentence
by us, in our opinion, constitutes a relevant ground for reducing
the sentence to life imprisonment. In the present case the 3ppellant must have been in the condemned cell ever since October 30,
1971 when the sentence of death was imposed on .him by the trial
court.
The High Court confirmed the sentence as far back as
January 24, 1972.
Since then the agonising consciousness and
feeling of being under the sentence of death must have constantly
haunted the appellant.
No doubt, this delay has been caused
because of the time taken biY the High Court in disposing of the
applica:tion for leave to appeal to this Court and because of the
pendency of the application for special leave to appeal in this Court
since October, 1972.
But that cannot detract from the acute
mental agony to which the appellant must have been subjeC'ted
ever since the imposition of the capital sentence on him.
We find thM in July, 1972 this Court issued notice to the res·
pondent State to show cause why special leave should not be
granted in regard to the sentence.
The notice was apparently
issued without any delay. Btl't the matter was unfortunately not
set down for hearing till March 1, 1973. This delay wa; perhaps
due to the fact that the respondent-State did not put in appearance.
Indeed, he State was not represented at the hearing either of the
special leave pe·tition or of the appeal before us.
Now the. im·
portance of speedy disposal of cases involving sentence of death
has been recognised by this Court, for, in r. 21 (2) of O.XXI, it
is expressly provided that in such cases the printed record shall
be made ready and despatched to this Court within a period of
60 days after the receipt oi intimation from the registry of this
Court of the filing <Jlthe petition of appeal or of the order granting
special leave to appeal. The same anxiety ang concern for speedy
disposal of special leave petitions in such cases. is equally desirable.
It appears that the importance of speedy hearing of the petition
for special leave was not realised in this case. In our view, the
neglect or unwillingness of the Slate to enter appearance should
not have prevented the postin!! or the special leave petition for
bearing with the greatest possible dispatch.
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NET! SREEllAMULU v. A. P. STATE (Dua, J.)
849
On the facts and circumstances of this case we feel that rhe
interests of justice require that the sentence of death should be
reduced to that of life imprisonment and we so order. The fact
that the State of Andhra Pradesh has not cared to enter appearance
in spite of notice suggests that in the opinion of the legal advisors
of the State there was no g<>od cause to show against the reductioa
of sentence. In Piare Dusadh & · others v. Emperor(1)
the
sentence of death was reduced to one of transportation for life
when the conviot had inter alia been awaiting execution of death
~entencc for over a year. The Federal Court there observed :-
"In committing the offence the appellant must have
been actuated by jealousy or by indignation either of
which would tend further to disturb the balance of his
mind.
He has besides been awaiting the execution of
his death sentence for over a year.
We think that in
this case a sentence of transportation for life would be
more appropriate than the sentenee of death."
These observations are equally pertinent to the case in hand.
The appeal is accordingly allowed and the appellant's sentence
is reduced to that 'of imprisonment for life.
.
s.c.
Appeal a/low~d.
(I) A.l.R. 1944 F.C.I.