The Madras High Court Bench here has created a record of sorts by disposing of as many as 250 criminal appeals filed against trial court judgements in heinous offences that attract more than 10 years of imprisonment and 709 habeas corpus petitions related to both statutory and non-statutory detention in just 52 working days.
According to statistics available with the High Court Registry, a Division Bench of Justices S. Nagamuthu and V.S. Ravi had also disposed of 62 writ petitions, 30 writ appeals, 10 civil appeals and a few other cases taking the total disposal of main cases to 1,074 apart from 270 interlocutory petitions disposed of along with the main cases.
Madurai Bench of Madras High Court Bar Association (MMBA) president M. Subash Babu said that this was the first time since the establishment of the High Court Bench here in July 2004 that a Division Bench had disposed about five criminal appeals on every working day. He attributed the achievement to the confidence gained by junior lawyers to argue appeals.
“There was no necessity for engaging senior counsels since the judges gave the same relief irrespective of the experience of the counsel arguing the case. This encouraged lawyers to volunteer to present their cases before the Bench,” he said.
The MMBA president also pointed out that there was quick disposal of appeals because both the judges were well versed in criminal law with the senior judge having been an acclaimed defence lawyer before his elevation as a judge and the other having dealt with numerous criminal cases during his long tenure in the district judiciary.
However, pointing out that a majority of the murder cases heard by the Division Bench had ended up in acquittal, he said that a detailed study of the judgements passed in the 250 criminal appeals would give the police department a clear idea about how the prosecution should go about investigating crimes and avoid mistakes that lead to such acquittal.
“Detailed study of judgements would give the police a clear idea about how the prosecution should go about investigating crimes”
