Sidhu gets 1-year jail in road rage case | Latest News India - Hindustan Times
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Sidhu gets 1-year jail in road rage case

By, New Delhi
May 20, 2022 01:41 AM IST

According to the prosecution, Gurnam Singh was beaten up by Sidhu in a road rage incident at Patiala in December 1988. The victim was taken to a hospital where he was declared dead.

The consequences of losing temper must be borne, the Supreme Court said on Thursday while sentencing Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu to one year in jail in a 1988 road rage case from Punjab, in which he was let off three years ago with a fine of meagre 1,000.

Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu (AFP)
Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu (AFP)

Enhancing Sidhu’s punishment on a plea filed by the family members of 65-year-old Gurnam Singh, who died in the road rage incident involving Sidhu and his friend Rupinder Singh Sandhu, a bench of justices AM Khanwilkar and Sanjay Kishan Kaul handed out the maximum punishment to the former cricketer under Section 323 of the Indian Penal Code. The maximum punishment under Section 323 (voluntarily causing hurt) of the IPC is a jail term of one year or a fine of 1,000.

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“In addition to the fine imposed, we consider it appropriate to impose a sentence of imprisonment for a period of one-year rigorous imprisonment to be undergone by respondent No.1 (Sidhu),” stated the court order.

The court order comes as a huge setback for Sidhu, who lost elections from Amritsar East in the Punjab Assembly polls concluded in March, and also quit his post of Punjab Congress chief following the party’s rout. The beleaguered Congress leader has the option of filing a curative petition against this order, which is the last recourse available to a litigant in the top court.

Meanwhile, Sidhu, 58, took to Twitter to say he “will submit to the majesty of law”.

The bench admitted that “indulgence was not required to be shown” by the Supreme Court in May 2018 when it chose not to impose any jail term on Sidhu even though the incident eventually resulted in the death of a senior citizen.

“A disproportionately light punishment humiliates and frustrates a victim of crime when the offender goes unpunished or is let off with a relatively minor punishment as the system pays no attention to the injured’s feelings. Indifference to the rights of the victim of crime is fast eroding the faith of society in general and the victim of crime, in particular, in the criminal justice system,” held the bench.

The court said that the 2018 judgment missed out certain material aspects such as Sidhu’s physical fitness and awareness of the force of a blow that even his hand would carry when he hit a 65-year-old man.

“Respondent No.1 (Sidhu) cannot say that he did not know the effect of the blow or plead ignorance on this aspect. It is not as if someone has to remind him of the extent of the injury which could be caused by a blow inflicted by him...The hand can also be a weapon by itself where say a boxer, a wrestler or a cricketer or an extremely physically fit person inflicts the same,” said the bench.

Noting that a single fist blow by Sidhu on the deceased’s head in the fateful incident stands established, the court said that losing sight of the significance of this fact “is an error apparent on the face of the record, needing some remedial action.”

“When a 25-year-old man, who was an international cricketer, assaults a man more than twice his age and inflicts, even with his bare hands, a severe blow on the victim’s head, the unintended consequence of harm would still be properly attributable to him as it was reasonably foreseeable...In the given circumstances, tempers may have been lost but then the consequences of the loss of temper must be borne. Any undue sympathy to impose inadequate sentence would do more harm to the justice system and undermine the public confidence in the efficacy of law,” it emphasised.

The bench accepted submissions by senior advocate Sidharth Luthra, who on behalf of the deceased’s family argued that the punishment must be proportionate to the offence and should take into account the deterrence aspect.

Underscoring the importance of proportionality between the seriousness of the crime and the punishment in its verdict, the top court maintained that an inadequate sentence would fail to produce a deterrent effect on the society at large and may ultimately lead to the sufferance of the community.

“If the courts do not protect the injured, the injured would then resort to private vengeance and, therefore, it is the duty of every court to award proper sentence having regard to the nature of the offence and the manner in which it was executed or committed,” it further highlighted.

Rejecting Sidhu’s legal objections to the demands by the deceased’s family to enhance his punishment, the court said that the near and dear ones, whether as guardians or legal heirs, are required to be treated as victims.

The bench turned down the family’s plea to enhance the scope of the review plea and also consider convicting Sidhu under the graver charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder but agreed that a fitting punishment has to be given in the facts of the case.

According to the prosecution, Gurnam Singh was beaten up by Sidhu in a road rage incident at Patiala in December 1988. The victim was taken to a hospital where he was declared dead.

Sidhu was acquitted by a trial court in September 1999, but this judgment was reversed by the high court in December 2006. The high court held Sidhu and co-accused RS Sandhu guilty of culpable homicide not amounting to murder. It sentenced Sidhu to three years in jail.

They challenged this in the Supreme Court, which held Sidhu guilty under the minor charge of causing hurt while Sandhu was exonerated of all charges, by an order in May 2018.

On the family’s review petition, in September 2018, the Supreme Court issued a notice to Sidhu on the limited question of revisiting the quantum of punishment awarded to him.

Appearing for the family, senior advocate Luthra argued that the 2018 judgment letting off Sidhu lightly failed to heed two previous judgments of the Supreme Court, which declared that intention of the accused is irrelevant when his assault causes death of a person. Luthra added that there cannot be leniency in sentencing when the injury has resulted in death, nor can the delay in trial be taken into account which was not attributable to the complainants.

Responding to the court notice, Sidhu filed his affidavit in February 2022, stating that he has had “an impeccable political and sporting career in the last three decades” and that he should not be punished with a jail term.

He added that more than three decades have passed since the date of the incident and that there were numerous cases in which the court considered fine as an adequate punishment if there has been a long passage of time from the date of offence.

Senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi and R Basant appeared for Sidhu in the Supreme Court, and argued in March that a review petition on the quantum of sentence was not maintainable in law. They added that even a fine is fully adequate without any incarceration when there is a prolonged time since the date of the incident.

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