Important Point
Offence under Section 326 IPC cannot be allowed to be compounded in view of legislative mandate contained in Section 320(9) of Cr.P.C.

Judgment

Shah, J.-Leave granted.

2. These appeals are filed against the judgment and order dated 5th September, 1997 and 10th November, 1997 passed by the High Court of Orissa at Cuttack in Criminal Revision No. 436 of 1994 and Miscellane­ous Case No. 521 of 1997 whereby Revision Petition against the convic­tion order and the application for correction, alteration and for compounding offence filed by the appellants were rejected.

3. The appellants were convicted and sentenced under Section 307, 326, 325, 324 and 323 read with Section 34, IPC and sentenced to 5 years R.I. and fine of Rs. 200/- in default of payment of which to undergo R.I. for one month. That Order was challenged before the High Court by filing Criminal Revision No. 436 of 1994. After considering the entire evidence on record, the Court held that from the nature and extent of the injuries sustained by the injured, and also from the manner in which the car struck against the injured, it was difficult to come to a conclusion that the intention of the accused was to kill the injured and, therefore, it would be hazardous to uphold their conviction under Section 307 IPC. After considering the injuries caused to the witness, the High Court altered the conviction of the appellants under Section 326, 325, 324 and 323 read with Section 34 IPC and having regard to the facts and circumstances of thecase and the affidavit of the wit­ness produced on record, the Court imposed sentence of six month’s R.I. and fine of Rs. 1,000/- in default of payment of which to undergo R.I. for further three months for the offence under Section 326 IPC and no separate sentence was imposed on the other counts of offences. Against that order, these appeals are filed by special leave.

4. It is vehemently contended by the learned Counsel for the appellants that as the dispute was amicably settled and the matter was compromised, the High Court ought to have granted permission to compound the offences and ought not to have convicted the appellants and imposed the sentence. For this purpose, reliance is placed upon the decisions of this Court in Ram Pujan & Ors. v. State of Uttar Pradesh1 and Mahesh Chand & Anr. v. State of Rajasthan2. As against this, learned Counsel for the respondent submitted that the offence under Section 326 is not compoundable and the High Court has rightly rejected the application for compounding the same. He, for this pur­pose, relied upon the Judgment of this Court in Ram Lal & Anr. v. State of J & K3 wherein after referring to Section 320(9) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the Court observed that the decision in Mahesh Chand (supra) was rendered perincuriam.

5. In our view, submission of the learned Counsel for the respondent requires to be accepted. For compounding of the offences punishable under the Indian Penal Code, complete scheme is provided under Section 320 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973. Sub-Section (1) of Sec­tion 320 provides that the offences mentioned in the table provided thereunder can be compounded by the persons mentioned in Column No. 3 of the said table. Further, sub-Section (2) provides that, the offences mentioned in the table could be compounded by the victim with the permission of the Court. As against this, sub-section (9) specifi­cally provides that “no offence shall be compounded except as provided by this Section.” In view of the aforesaid legislative mandate, only the offences which are covered by table 1 or 2 as stated above can be compounded and the rest of the offences punishable under Indian Penal Code could not be compounded.

6. Further, decision in Ram Pujan’s case (supra) does not advance the contention raised by the appellants. In the said case, the Court held that the major offences for which accused have been convicted were no doubt non-compoundable, but the fact of compromise can be taken into account in determining the quantum of sentence. In Ram Lal (supra), the Court referred to the decision of this Court in Y. Suresh Bab