Criminal law

No prior sanction of the government is required, under section 17A of Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 (PC Act), for offences like falsification of accounts, breach of trust and misappropriation of funds or acts which are ex facie criminal in nature. The Kerala High Court held this in Shankara Bhat v. State of Kerala & Ors, while deciding a few connected matters.

The High Court of Kerala in Thadevoose Sebastian v The Regional Passport Office says that the grant of permission by the Magistrate enabling an accused to travel abroad will be of great significance, especially since it will be a process of balancing the fundamental right of a citizen to travel abroad and the need to ensure the presence of the accused during trial.

Sexual intercourse of a man with a woman against her will or without her free consent is rape under, Section 375 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The consent should be an unequivocal voluntary agreement of the woman by words, gesture or any form of verbal or non-verbal communication, by which she communicates her willingness to participate in the sexual act in question.

In Krishnan M.C vs State Of Kerala, a Division Bench of the Kerala High Court, in view of the conflicting decisions in different cases, examined as part of a reference whether the accused has got a right to get the second sample taken for analysis to the Chemical Examiner’s Laboratory, under Section 8 of the Kerala Abkari Shops Disposal Rules,2002. It was decided by the bench that the accused has no right seek chemical analysis of B Sample. There is no specific provision in the law for the purpose, as well.

When a complainant dies, the Magistrate cannot proceed with the case merely on the ground that the pleader, appointed by the deceased-complainant, is present in the court to continue the proceedings. In such a scenario, his pleader retains no authority and cannot, therefore, be allowed to continue to proceed with the complaint in the capacity of the pleader of the deceased-complainant. Therefore, he cannot be allowed to represent the complaint, under Section 256(2) of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC).

The legal position regarding the conviction on sole testimony of prosecutrix even without any corroboration is now well settled. In a large number of cases, the accused was convicted on the sole testimony of the prosecutrix without any corroboration.

The criminal courts in India can conduct trial against an Indian citizen for the offences he has committed outside India but the trial cannot commence without previous sanction of the Central Government under Section 3 and 4 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (IPC) and Section 188 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (CrPC).

The documents which are not part of the charge sheet, but seized by the investigating agency during the investigation of the offence, cannot be withheld by the prosecution merely on the ground that the documents sought to be summoned are not part of the charge sheet, the Gujarat High Court held in a revision application in Sanjiv Rajendra Bhat v State of Gujarat.

Appeal against an order of acquittal is an extra ordinary remedy. It would put the already exonerated accused once again under shade of suspicion and troubles. Therefore, some restrictions are there in the appeal provisions.