The Supreme Court observed that for the offence under Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 i.e., SC/ST Act, there must be allegation that the accused had committed offence under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) against a member of SC/ST knowing that such person belongs to such community.
The Court was deciding an appeal preferred by the accused challenging the Allahabad High Court judgment that had upheld rejection of the application for discharge filed by the accused.
The two-Judge Bench of Justice P.S. Narasimha and Justice Sandeep Mehta observed, “From a bare perusal of the provision, it is crystal clear that for the above offence to be constituted, there must be an allegation that the accused not being a member of Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe committed an offence under the IPC punishable for a term of 10 years or more against a member of the Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe knowing that such person belongs to such ‘community’.”
The Bench said that it is manifest that the incident had the undertones of a political rivalry.
Senior Advocate R Basant represented the appellant while AAG Sharan Dev Singh Thakur represented the respondent.
Factual Background -
The accused appellants had questioned the legality and validity of the order passed by the Single Judge of the Allahabad High Court rejecting the Criminal Appeal preferred by the appellants under Section 14A(1) of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 (hereinafter being referred to as the ‘SC/ST Act’). The appellate Court had affirmed the order passed by the Special Judge SC/ST (PoA) Act, Hathras in a session case, rejecting the application for discharge filed by the accused appellants under Section 227 of the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 (CrPC) and directing framing of charges against them for the offences punishable under Sections 147, 148, 149, 307, 323, and 504 of the IPC and Section 3(2)(v) of the SC/ST Act. By the said order, the Special Judge also directed that the accused appellants shall remain present in the Court on the appointed date.
The Supreme Court in the above context of the case noted, “At this stage, we may note that though learned counsel for the appellants gave up the challenge to the charge framed against the accused appellants for the offence punishable under Section 307 IPC but the fact remains that when the witness Rinku Thakur who alleged that he was shot upon by the accused Vinod Upadhyay, was medically examined, no corresponding gun shot injury was observed on his person.”
The Court said that as per the highest case of prosecution, the only offence under IPC punishable with imprisonment of 10 years or more being the offence under Section 307 IPC has been applied on the basis of the gun shot allegedly fired by the accused, which admittedly did not result into any corresponding injury.
“After perusal of the entire material on record, we have no hesitation in concluding that from the admitted case set up by the prosecution, there is no such allegation that the offence under IPC punishable with imprisonment of 10 years or more was committed by an accused of upper caste upon a person belonging to the Scheduled Caste community with the knowledge that such person belonged to the said community”, added the Court.
Accordingly, the Apex Court allowed the appeal and quashed the impugned orders.
Cause Title- Shashikant Sharma & Ors. v. State of Uttar Pradesh & Anr. (Neutral Citation: 2023 INSC 1036)
