SC seeks Centre's response on consecutive sentence

The Supreme Court on Monday sought response from the Centre and the Law Commission on a PIL stating that the sentence under special laws covering terrorism, separatism and corruption should be consecutive and not concurrent.

The Division Bench, comprising Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justice Deepak Gupta, issued the notice on the PIL filed by BJP leader Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay seeking the sentence for offences under the special laws dealing with terrorism, separatism, corruption, unlawful activities, money laundering, black money and fugitive economic offenders should run consecutively -- one after the other -- and not concurrently.

The laws under which the petitioner has contended this that more than one sentence should be served consecutively, include the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, the Prohibition of Benami Property Transactions Act, 1988, the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002, the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, 2010, the Black Money (Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets) and Imposition of Tax Act, 2015 and the Fugitive Economic Offenders Act, 2018.

Upadhyay has contended his PIL was rooted in April 30, 2016, calling for a more stringent Prevention of Money Laundering Act with increased jail-term by the Vice-Chairman of the special investigation team (SIT) on black money Justice Arijit Pasayat, but the government is yet to act on it.

The petitioner has contended that the injury caused to the public because of corruption, black money generation and benami transactions badly affected the fundamental rights guaranteed under Article 21 -- the right to health, shelter, water, justice, development and livelihood.

Upadhyay has cited the instances of overseas jurisdictions where convicts under special laws were sentenced to long years of incarceration.

Citing examples, the petitioner said Terry Nichols was sentenced to 161 consecutive life-terms without parole for killing 161 Americans; Abdulla Barghouti was sentenced to 67 life-terms plus 5,200 years in prison for killing 66 Israelis; Gary Ridgway was sentenced to 49 life-terms plus 480 years in prison for killing 71 prostitutes.

Similarly, Loi Khac Nguyen was sentenced to 49 consecutive life-terms without parole for kidnapping 35 Americans; Martin Bryant was sentenced to 35 life-terms plus 1,035 years in prison for killing 35 Australians.

The petitioner further contended that India could not move forward without clean and transparent governance, for which corruption-free society was a basic requirement.

"There is no country in the top 50 of the Human Development Index, which has significant amount of corruption and money laundering," the petitioner said, pointing out that there was a "correlation between welfare state with apposite attention to education and public health and the absence of corruption and money laundering."

"It is the obligation of the state to take steps to curb black money generation", the petitioner said.

--IANS

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