The appellant challenged a Calcutta High Court judgment that reversed his trial court acquittal and found him guilty of rape and causing miscarriage. After reversing the acquittal, the High Court directed the appellant to surrender before the Trial Judge for the sole purpose of being heard and sentenced. The primary legal question was whether an appellate court, upon reversing an acquittal and recording a conviction for the first time, can delegate the statutory duty of sentencing back to the trial court.
The Supreme Court held that when an appellate court reverses an acquittal and convicts an accused for the first time, the judicial function of hearing the convict and passing the sentence belongs exclusively to that appellate court under Section 386(a) of the Cr.P.C.. Relegating or abdicating this duty to the trial court is a procedure unknown to law. Consequently, the Supreme Court set aside the High Court’s directive to surrender before the Trial Judge and remitted the matter back to the High Court to independently hear the appellant on the question of sentence and pass an appropriate order.
1. Factual Matrix and Procedural History
The appellant stood trial before the Sessions Judge, Andaman and Nicobar Islands at Port Blair, for allegedly committing offenses punishable under Sections 376 (rape), 312 (causing miscarriage), and 417 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). On April 24, 2024, the learned Sessions Judge acquitted the appellant of all charges.
The State and the victim independently appealed this acquittal before the High Court at Calcutta (Circuit Bench at Port Blair). On April 23, 2026, the High Court reversed the acquittal. It found that the appellant had sexually abused the victim under a false pretext of marriage from the inception of their relationship and had subsequently forced her to consume termination pills to shield her pregnancy. The High Court formally pronounced him guilty under Sections 376 and 312 of the IPC.
However, instead of conducting a sentencing hearing itself, the High Court directed the appellant to surrender before the Trial Judge by May 22, 2026, ordering the Trial Judge to take him into custody, hear him on the point of sentence, and pronounce punishment. The appellant challenged this procedure before the Apex Court.
2. Legal Analysis & Statutory Framework
A. The Mandate of Section 235(2) Cr.P.C.
The Supreme Court analyzed Chapter XVIII of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (Cr.P.C.), specifically Section 235 (equivalent to Section 258 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023). Section 235(2) mandates that if an accused is convicted, the judge shall hear the accused on the question of sentence before passing it according to law.
Relying on Allauddin Mian v. State of Bihar, the Court noted that this requirement is a fundamental rule of natural justice and fair play. Because the penal code provides a wide range of judicial discretion in sentencing, the convict must be afforded a real and effective opportunity to present mitigating data and personal circumstances before the court decides the quantum of punishment.
B. Powers of the Appellate Court Under Section 386(a) Cr.P.C.
The core of the dispute rested on what happens when a conviction is recorded for the first time by a higher court. The Supreme Court reviewed Section 386(a) of the Cr.P.C., which outlines the powers of an appellate court when hearing an appeal against an acquittal. The provision states that the appellate court may:
“…reverse such order and direct that further inquiry be made, or that the accused be re-tried or committed for trial, as the case may be, or find him guilty and pass sentence on him according to law;”
C. Invalidation of Remand for Sentencing
The Apex Court relied strongly on its previous ruling in Kumar Exports v. Sharma Carpets, which explicitly established that an appellate court cannot abdicate its judicial discretion or remit a case to a lower court solely for passing a sentence after it has already recorded a conviction.
The Supreme Court summarized the settled position across historical precedents:
- Correction of Omission: If a trial court omits to hear a convict on sentencing, a higher court can remedy the breach itself by granting a real and effective hearing rather than automatically remanding the matter (Dagdu v. State of Maharashtra).
- First-Time Conviction Duty: Where an appellate court or the Supreme Court convicts an individual for the first time, the appropriate course of action is to adjourn the matter to a suitable future date, hear the convict on the question of sentence, and independently pass the punishment (Suryamoorthi v. Govindaswamy and Kamalakar Nandram Bhavsar v. State of Maharashtra).
The High Court’s directive delegating the sentencing process to the Trial Judge was therefore determined to be completely contrary to the statutory layout of Section 386(a) of the Cr.P.C..
3. Final Order and Directives
The Supreme Court partly allowed the appeals and issued the following instructions:
- The portion of paragraph 108 of the Calcutta High Court’s judgment directing the appellant to surrender before the Trial Judge for sentencing is explicitly set aside.
- The substantive merits of the conviction itself were not evaluated at this juncture, as the Supreme Court deemed such a review premature until a lawful sentence is formally passed.
- The appeals [CRA (DB)/6/2024 and CRA (DB)/4/2024] stand restored to the file of the Calcutta High Court.
- The High Court is directed to fix a specific date to hear the convict on the issue of sentence, after which the High Court must impose the appropriate punishment itself in accordance with law.
- Post-sentencing, the appellant retains full liberty to challenge both the conviction and the sentence afresh.
- The Registrar General of the Supreme Court was directed to transmit the judgment to the Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court for necessary administrative and systemic compliance.
2026 INSC 559
Mukesh Kumar Yadav V. State (Ut of Andaman & Nicobar Islands) Etc. (D.O.J. 26.05.2026)
