Calcutta High Court (Appellete Side)
Asit Raptan @ Puti vs The State Of West Bengal on 24 November, 2021
IN THE HIGH COURT AT CALCUTTA
CRIMINAL REVISIONAL JURISDICTION
Present:
The Hon'ble Justice Jay Sengupta
C.R.R. 2322 of 2021
Asit Raptan @ Puti
Versus
The State of West Bengal
For the petitioner : Ms. Malashree Ghosh
..... Advocate
For the State : Mr. Imran Ali
Mr. MFA Begg
.... Advocates
Heard on : 24.11.2021
Judgment on : 24.11.2021
Jay Sengupta, J.:
This is an application seeking for an expeditious disposal of a
proceeding in which a charge-sheet was submitted under Section 21
(c) of the NDPS Act.
2
Let a copy of this application be served upon Mr. Imran Ali and
Mr. MFA Begg, learned advocates, who are present in Court today and
who ordinarily appear on behalf of the State. Their engagement may
be regularised in due course by the competent authority of the State.
Learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner submits as
follows. The petitioner is an accused in this case. He was arrested on
05.10.2019
the date on which the FIR was lodged. He is in custody for
about 770 days. The charge-sheet was submitted in 2019 and the
supplementary charge-sheet submitted in 2021. Charge was framed
on 23.08.2021. 07.12.2021 was fixed for evidence. On 22.02.2021, the
next date was fixed for production and framing of charge on
08.06.2021. In the meantime, the petitioner had sought expeditious
disposal of the proceeding and moved the High Court. This Court, by
an order dated 05.03.2021 passed in CRR 501 of 2021, was pleased to
direct the learned trial Court to conclude the proceeding expeditiously.
The same was brought to the notice of the learned Court on
10.3.2021. Yet, the same date i.e. 08.06.2021 was retained as the next
date. Again on 17.03.2021, a put up application was filed on behalf of
the petitioner praying for preponing of the case in view of the order
passed by the High Court. As a result, the learned trial Court fixed
07.05.2021 as the next date. It appears that thereafter on 08.06.2021,
again the learned Court fixed the date for production and framing of
charge on 05.10.2021 i.e., a date after nearly four months. The
petitioner continued to languish in custody and kept on filing put up
petitions referring to the High Court's order and praying for
expeditious disposal of the proceeding, but to no avail. The learned
said Court kept on fixing long dates and the matter has remained
pending for no fault of the petitioner.
Learned counsel for the State submits that this is a fit case
where a direction should be passed upon the learned trial Court to
conclude the proceeding expeditiously.
I have heard the submissions of the learned counsels appearing
on behalf of the petitioner and the State and have perused the revision
petition.
It appears that an inordinate delay has been occasioned in
concluding the trial, especially considering the fact that the petitioner
is in custody since his date of arrest in 2019.
It is unfortunate that despite an order passed by this Court
directing expeditious disposal of the proceeding, the learned trial
Court has only paid lip service to the same. It continue to fix long
dates and failed to take proper initiative to ensure that the trial is
concluded at the earliest. The right of the accused to speedy trial
cannot be dealt with in such casual manner.
In view of the above and in the interest of justice, I request the
learned trial Court to conclude the proceeding as expeditiously as
possible without granting any unnecessary adjournment to any of the
parties, preferably within a period of eight months from the next date
of hearing.
With these observations, the revisional application is disposed of.
Urgent photostat certified copies of this order may be delivered to
the learned Advocates for the parties, if applied for, upon compliance
of all formalities.
(Jay Sengupta, J)
ssi
