IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Criminal Revision No.446 of 2005 Date of Decision 22.11.2010 Jagtar Singh @ Tari ...... Petitioner VERSUS State of Punjab ...... Respondent CORAM:- HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE A.N.JINDAL Present: Mr.G.S.Sandhu, Advocate, for the petitioner. Mr.Amit Chaudhary, Asstt. Advocate General, Punjab, for the respondent-State. ***** A.N.JINDAL, J: This petition is directed against the judgment dated 02.12.2004, passed by the Appellate Court, dismissing the appeal against the judgment dated 12.07.2004, passed by Chief Judicial Magistrate, Faridkot, convicting and sentencing the petitioner-accused (herein referred as 'the petitioner') to undergo rigorous imprisonment for a period of one year and to pay a fine of Rs.5,000/- under Section 61(1)(c) of the Punjab Excise Act, 1914 (for brevity 'the Act'). The allegations against the petitioner are that he was apprehended while operating the working still and thereby distilling illicit liquor in his house. The lahan and illicit liquor were recovered from his possession. He was charged, tried and ultimately convicted and sentenced accordingly. His appeal also failed. Without assailing the judgment of conviction, learned counsel for the petitioner seeks some leniency on the quantum of sentence. Criminal Revision No.446 of 2005 -2- Even otherwise, on scrutiny of the impugned judgment, the evidence, as examined by the prosecution, appears to have been appreciated in the right perspective. No such illegality much less irregularity was found or detected in the conduct of trial or procedure, which may result into miscarriage of justice or cause any prejudice to the petitioner, therefore, the findings returned by both the Courts below do not call for any interference at this revisional stage. Now coming to the quantum of sentence, it is noticed that the occurrence took place way back in the year 2000. The petitioner has already suffered a lot of agony on account of the pendency of proceedings in the Courts for the last ten years and the sword of sentence remained hanging over his head since then. He has already undergone more than 3½ months of the substantive sentence. Under the peculiar circumstances of this case, it would be in the fitness of things to reduce the sentence to some extent. Resultantly, this petition is dismissed with the modification in the sentence,which is reduced to six months without any alteration in the sentence of fine. Copy of the order be sent to Chief Judicial Magistrate, Faridkot, for compliance. (A.N.Jindal) Judge 22.11.2010 mamta-II