No takers in AP for plea bargain

Mar 20, 2012 - U. SUDHAKAR REDDY |

Hyderabad

Tags:

plea bargaining

xThe city police and prosecutors have failed to promote the “plea bargaining” provision in the Criminal Procedure Code that enables speedy delivery of justice in criminal cases. Plea bargaining is a provision in CrPC, and it came into effect in July 2006. It allows an accused to bargain regarding punishment in criminal cases.

Lack of awareness among the public and cops has resulted in this provision being under utilised. Around 11 lakh cases are pending in state courts. IG Santosh Mehra’s efforts to promote plea bargaining came to a standstill as he was transferred recently. When he was additional commissioner of police (crime) in the city, he wrote a letter to all city policemen bringing plea bargaining to their notice.

Another IPS official of police headquarters said, “This concept, popular in the West, has failed to take off in the state. Plea bargaining is applicable for offences for which punishment is up to 7-year impri-sonment. The accused has to file the application voluntarily when the offence is pending for trial.”

It is not applicable for offences that affect socio-economic condition of the country and those committed against women or children. In this, the complainant and accused are given time to dispose the case with mutual satisfaction that includes the accused paying compensation or other expenses incurred by the victim. In plea bargaining, court can dispose of the case by sentencing the accused to one-fourth of the punishment or more and judgement would be final and can’t be appealed. The statement in the plea can’t be used for any other purpose.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/135416" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd></li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-706929a9ff89a209d863ca17a191cca2" value="form-706929a9ff89a209d863ca17a191cca2" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="85618424" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>