Allahabad High Court
Priyanka vs State Of U.P. Thru. Prin. Secy. ... on 1 June, 2022
Bench: Alok Mathur
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD, LUCKNOW BENCH
?Court No. - 10
Case :- MATTERS UNDER ARTICLE 227 No. - 1865 of 2022
Petitioner :- Priyanka
Respondent :- State Of U.P. Thru. Prin. Secy. Home Lko And 6 Others
Counsel for Petitioner :- Dharmendra Kumar,Rajneesh Kumar Pandey
Counsel for Respondent :- G.A.
Hon'ble Alok Mathur,J.
1. Heard Sri Dharmendra Kumar Pandey, learned counsel for the petitioner.
2 By means of the present petition it has been prayed that a direction may be issued to Additional Civil Judge (Senior Division) Third, Faizabad to expedite the trial of case No.0471 of 2019 under Sections 498A, 494, 323, 504, 506 IPC and Section 3/4 of Dowry Prohibition Act (State Vs. Mukesh and others) as expeditiously as possible.
3. It has been stated that the petitioner is the complainant who had lodged the first information report under Sections-498A, 494, 323, 504, 506 IPC and Section 3/4 of Dowry Prohibition Act at police station Kotwali Bikapur, District Faizabad on 23.7.2019. After the investigation was done charge sheet has been filed in the court of competent jurisdiction on 5.10.2019 and cognizance was taken on 27.2.23022 and the case was committed for trial. Presently dates are being fixed for framing of charges. It has been submitted by learned counsel for the petitioner that the case is being got adjourned on one pretext or the other by the accused and, hence, he has filed present petition.
4. Needless to say that it is the right of the accused for speedy trial but in the jurisdiction under Article 227 of the Constitution of India the Court has to be prima facie satisfied that there has been some unreasonable delay in conclusion of the trial before embarking on exercise of the said extraordinary jurisdiction under Article 227 of the Constitution. It is noticed that charge sheet was filed only in 2019 and the case is fixed for framing of charges, it cannot be said that there has been extraordinary delay in the process necessitating interference by this Court at this stage. Even the Supreme Court in the case of M. Gopalakrishnan and others Vs. Pasumpon Muturamalingam and another passed on 11.3.2022 in Special Leave Petition (Criminal) Diary No.30839 of 2021 has cautioned the High Courts in interfering in the trial and fixing time limit for conclusion of the trials, as under:-
"Looking to the nature of the order passed by the High Court, we are not inclined to grant leave to appeal in this matter but feel impelled to observe that ordinarily, before passing any such order for expeditious proceedings in a particular case (which might appear to be rather of innocuous nature), it would be appropriate for the higher Court to appreciate that any such order for one case, without cogent and extremely compelling reasons, might upset the calendar and schedule of the subordinate Court; might result in assigning an unwarranted priority to that particular case over and above other cases pending in that Court; and progression of such other cases might suffer for no reason and none of the faults of the litigants involved therein."
5.Considering the aforesaid judgment of the Supreme Court and the facts of the present case, no ground is made out for interference in the matter. Accordingly, the present petition is dismissed. However, it is observed that efforts should be made by the court concerned to expedite the trial.
Order Date :- 1.6.2022 (Alok Mathur, J.)
RKM.
