A convict whose death sentence had been commuted to life imprisonment by the President can be ordered to undergo the punishment concurrently along with sentences imposed on him in other cases, the Madras High Court Bench here has ruled.
Justice G.M. Akbar Ali passed the order on a direction petition filed by the brother of C. Selvam, a convict in the 1997 murder of a gangster in a court hall at Nagercoil in Kanyakumari district.
The petitioner, C. Vijayakumar, said the murder led to the conviction of seven persons by a Sessions Court at Tirunelveli on October 5, 1998. While four were awarded life imprisonment, Selvam and two others — Sheik Meeran and Radhakrishnan — were awarded the death sentence.
Court building bombedAccording to the prosecution, the convicts had inflicted 12 cut wounds on the face and head of the gangster in the court hall before dragging his body to the compound wall in public view. They had also hurled a country bomb on the court building before escaping.
The Principal Seat of the High Court in Chennai confirmed the death sentence on April 30, 1999, and the Supreme Court dismissed a Special Leave Petition from the convicts, on June 21, 1999, as the execution was scheduled for July 15, 1999.
Mercy petitionHowever, the convicts escaped the gallows following a mercy petition submitted by them to the President, who, on June 25, 2012, commuted their sentence to life imprisonment under Article 72 (power of the President to grant pardon) of the Constitution.
Another caseCounsel for the petitioner T. Lajapathi Roy said a sessions court at Kanyakumari convicted Selvam on January 6, 2003, in another murder case, also filed in 1997, and sentenced him to life imprisonment.
Since the Kanyakumari court did not mention that the sentence should run concurrently with the punishment awarded in the other case, counsel feared that letting the sentences run consecutively would prove detrimental to the possible release of the prisoner in future on account of good conduct.