Plea bargaining is unconstitutional, illegal, and against public policy in the Indian criminal justice system. Criminal cases should be decided on merits, and the accused's confession of guilt should not be a ground for reducing the sentence.

1. Leave granted.

2. These appeals by special leave are filed by the State of U.P. against the judgment and order dated 28th November, 1997 passed by the High Court of judicature at Allahabad in Criminal Appeal Nos. 2747-48 of 1980 whereby the High Court accepted the plea bargain and maintained the conviction of the respondent under S.304 Part I, IPC but altered the sentence to the period of imprisonment already undergone (without stating actual period of imprisonment undergone by the respondent) plus a fine of Rs.5000/- in default of payment R.I. for six months. The respondent along with two others was charged under S.302 read with S.307 and 34 IPC for committing the murder of one Shyamadeo in Sessions Case No. 233 of 1980. The Sessions Judge, Ballia by his judgment and order dated 28.11.1980 convicted the respondent under S.304 IPC and sentenced him to undergo eight years R.I. Aggrieved by the said order, respondent preferred an appeal before the High Court and at the time of hearing opted not to challenge the findings of conviction recorded by the trial court with a view to bargain on the question of sentence. Learned Single Judge, (Malaviya, J.) accepted the bargain and allowed the appeal by observing inter alia that as the incident had taken place long back and since the appellant had been in jail for sometime, both as undertrial prisoner and as a convict, it was desirable to substitute his remaining period of jail sentence as awarded by the trial court and altered the sentence as stated above. The State has challenged that judgment and order by filing these appeals.

3. It is apparent that the order passed by the High Court is, on the face of it, illegal and erroneous. It appears that the learned judge has overlooked the settled law or is unaware that concept of 'plea bargaining' is not recognized and is against public policy under our criminal justice system. S.320 Cr.P.C. provides for compounding of certain offences with the permission of the Court and certain others even without permission of the Court. Except the above, the concept of negotiated settlement in criminal cases is not permissible. The method of short circuiting the hearing and deciding the criminal appeals or cases involving serious offences requires no encouragement. Neither the State nor the Public Prosecutor nor even the judge can bargain that evidence would not be led or appreciated in consideration of getting flee bite sentence by pleading guilty.

4. For this purpose, we would first refer to the decision in Madanlal Ram Chandra Daga etc. v. State of Maharashtra (1968 (3) SCR 34) (Page No. 39), wherein this Court held:

"In our opinion, it is very wrong for a Court to enter into a bargain of this character. Offences should be tried and punished according to the guilt of the accused. If the Court thinks that leniency can be shown on the facts of the case it may impose a lighter sentence. But the Court should never be a party to a bargain by which money is recovered for the complainant through their agency. We do not approve of the action adopted by the High Court...".

5. Again the question of plea bargain was considered by this Court in Muralidhar Meghraj Loya v. State of Maharashtra (1976 (3) SCC 684) (para 13), and disapproved by following succinct observation:

"To begin with, we are free to confess to a hunch that the appellants had hastened with their pleas of guilty hopefully, induced by an informal, tripartite understanding of light sentence in lieu of nolo contenderestance. Many economic offenders resort to practice the Americans call 'plea bargaining', 'plea negotiation', 'trading out' and 'compromise in criminal cases' and the trial magistrate drowned by a docket burden nods assent to the sub rosa anterooms settlement. The businessman culprit, confronted by a sure prospect of the agony and ignominy of tenancy of a prison cell, 'trades out' of the situation, the bargain being a plea of guilt, coupled with a promise of 'no jail'. These ad