The court emphasized the importance of a psychological evaluation and the collection of relevant information for sentencing purposes.

ORDER

1. These proceedings arise from a judgment dated 25 November 2021 of a Division Bench of the High Court of Judicature at Bombay in Confirmation Case No 1 of 2019 and Criminal Appeal No 661 of 2019. The High Court by its impugned judgment has confirmed the sentence of death awarded by the trial court to the accused and dismissed the criminal appeal instituted by the accused, confirming the conviction and sentence.

2. Leave granted.

3. The execution of the sentence of death shall remain suspended pending the hearing and final disposal of the appeals.

4. In Manoj and Others vs State of Madhya Pradesh, 2022 SCC OnLine SC 677, a three-Judge Bench of this Court issued guidelines for ensuring that a psychiatric and psychological evaluation of the accused is carried out in order to enable the court to have necessary background material to assess whether the imposition of the sentence of death is justified. The guidelines have been spelt out, inter alia, in paragraphs 227 to 230 of the judgment (reported in SCC Online).

5. A criminal miscellaneous petition[1] has been instituted for the purposes of seeking the following directions:

a. Grant permission to Ms. Nuriya Ansari to physically visit the Applicant herein, namely Ramkirat Munnilal Goud in Yerwada Central Jail, Pune and conduct multiple in-person interviews for the purpose of collecting information relevant to sentencing;

b. Grant permission to Ms. Nuriya Ansari to record the interviews conducted by means of an audio recorder in a separate interviewing space, or alternatively, grant permission to allow a person nominated by the said mitigation investigator to accompany her to take notes during the interview;

c. Direct that such interviews be confidential and be conducted without any prison or police staff at earshot distance;

d. Grant permission to Ms. Nuriya Ansari to obtain documents or other written material pertaining to the Applicant, including but not limited to medical records, jail conduct, certificates of any educational, vocational or employment opportunities undertaken, etc. that the Applicant may wish to submit for the purpose of sentencing information;

e. Direct the Respondent to implement video-conferencing facilities through the National Prisons Information Portal (NPIP) in Yerwada Central Prison, Pune, so that the Applicant can regularly interact with. his legal representatives using video-conference facilities;

[1] CrlMP No 91490/2022

6. The criminal miscellaneous petition has been instituted by Project 39A which is set up under the auspices of National Law University Delhi for providing pro bono legal representation particularly to convicts who have been sentenced to death. Ms Nuriya Ansari, who holds a Master's degree in Applied Psychology from Amity University is working as a mitigating investigator at Project 39A.

7. The attention of the Court has been drawn to a set of directions which have been issued by this Court, inter alia, in Ganesh @ Pravin Popal Darandale vs State of Maharashtra[2] and Prakash Vishwanath Darandale vs State of Maharashtra[3], both on 19 October 2022.

[2] Crl.A. Nos.450-451/2020

[3] Crl.A. Nos.425-426/2020

8. We issue the following directions:

(i) The respondent-State shall place before this Court the report(s) of all the Probation Officers relating to the appellant within a period of eight weeks;

(ii) The Superintendent of the Yerwada Central Jail shall submit a report in regard to the nature of work which has been performed by the appellant while in jail and a report in regard to the conduct and behaviour of the appellant while in jail within a period of eight weeks;

(iii) The Head of Sassoon General Hospital, Pune shall constitute a suitable team for the purpose of carrying out a psychological evaluation of the appellant. The report of the evaluation shall be submitted to this Court through the Standing Counsel for the State of Maharashtra within a period of eight weeks; and

(iv) Ms Nuriya Ansari is permitted to have access to the appel