JUDGMENT

V. R. KRISHNA IYER, J.:— The petitioners have moved for bail setting out special grounds in support of the prayer. The State opposes on various grounds which we will presently set out. Once of us sitting as a Chamber Judge* had considered this question at some length and since the principles set out therein commend themselves to us. we are proceeding on the same lines and are inclined to reach the same conclusion.

* Cr. M. P No. 1448 of 1977 D/-6-12-77 : (reported in AIR 1978 SC 429)

2. Briefly we will state the facts pertinent to the present petition and prayer and proceed thereafter to ratiocinate on the relevant criteria in considering the interlocutory relief of bail. Right at the beginning. we must mention that, at an earlier stage, their application for bail was rejected by this Court on September 7, 1977, But an order refusing an application for bail does not necessarily preclude another, on a later occasion, giving more materials, further developments and different considerations. While we surely must set store by this circumstance, we cannot accede to the faint plea that we are barred from second consideration at a later stage. An interim direction is not a conclusive adjudication, and updated reconsider ration is not overturning an earlier negation. In this view, we entertain the application and evaluate the merits pro and con.

3. Shri R. K. Jain has brought to our notice certain significant factors which frown upon continuance of incarceration and favour provisional perhaps conditional, enlargement of the applicants.

4. All the petitioners were charged with an offence of murder under S. 302, I.P.C. but all of them were acquitted by the Sessions Court as early as November 4, 1972 The State successfully appealed against the acquittal and the High Court, reversing the findings of the Sessions Court, held all the petitioners guilty and sentenced them all to life imprisonment. This judgment was pronounced on May 20, 1977, after an unfortunately tragic sojourn of five years for an appeal in a murder case. Our justice system, even in grave cases, suffers from slow motion syndrome which is lethal to "fair trial". whatever the ultimate decision. Speedy justice is a component of social justice since the community, as a whole, is concerned in the criminal being condignly and finally punished within a reasonable time and the innocent being absolved from the inordinate ordeal of criminal proceedings. This is by the way, although it is important that judicial business management by engineering, not tinkering, so as to produce efficient expedition, is an urgent, high-priority item on the agenda of court reform, to be radically undertaken none too soon.

5. Back to the necessary facts. On the High Court upsetting the acquittal, the petitioners have come up to this Court exercising their statutory right of appeal. The present petition, as earlier stated, is the second one for bail, the first having been rejected about six months ago. The petitioners 1 to 5 have suffered sentence in some measure, having been imprisoned for about twenty months. The sixth petitioner had been on bail in the Sessions Court and had been free during the pendency of the appeal.

6. Certain other pregnant particulars deserve special mention. All the petitioners 1 to 5 are the entire male members of a filmily, and one point mentioned by Shri Jain is that all of them are in Jail. Their defence in this court may, therefore, be jeopardised. Another factor, equally meaningful, is that there is nothing indicated before us to show that during the long five years, when the petitioners had been out of prison, pending appeal, there had been any conduct on their part suggestive of disturbing the peace of the locality, threatening anyone in the village or otherwise thwarting the life of the community or the course of justice. Nay more. When the High Court entertained the appeal, the State did not press for their custody for apprehended absconsion or menace to peace and