V. Ramasubramanian, J.

1. All these revision petitions are filed purportedly under Sections 397 read with 401 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, seeking modification of the orders of acquittal passed by the Trial Courts in various cases against the petitioners, from one of acquittal on "benefit of doubt" to the "honourable acquittal".

2. We have heard M/s. J. John, K.N. Govardhanan, K.K. Ramakrishnan for Mr. K. Guhan, V.K. Saravanan, N. Mohamed Asif, M/s. Vairam & Villiam Associates, T. Vadivelan, T. Lajapathi Roy, S. Sundara Pandian, learned counsel for the petitioners and Mrs. S. Prabha, learned Government Advocate (Crl. side) for the respondents.

3. The petitioners in these revision petitions were involved in various criminal cases before various Courts. All of them were acquitted, after trial, of the charges framed against them. But, the acquittal was ordered by various Courts on the ground that the prosecution failed to prove the charges beyond reasonable doubt.

4. Since the orders of acquittal passed by criminal courts, using appendages such as "beyond reasonable doubt", "benefit of doubt" etc., are looked down upon by employers, particularly the State Government, the petitioners have come up with these revisions, praying for conversion of such acquittals into "honourable acquittals".

5. These cases were actually posted for hearing in the usual course, before the concerned Portfolio Judge P.N. Prakash, J. The learned Judge himself had allowed such revision petitions on the basis of similar orders passed by various other learned Judges of this Court, some of which are reported in Ramasamy v. State [2013-1-L.W. (Crl.) 420], R. Ramar v. State [2013-1-L.W. (Crl.) 431], and A. Stephen Raj v. State [2013 (2) MLJ (Crl) 28].

6. But, when the present batch of cases were posted before P.N. Prakash, J, the learned Judge took note of a judgment of the Hon'ble Supreme Court reported in Commissioner of Police v. Mehar Singh [2013 7 SCC 685]. In the said decision, the Supreme Court pointed out that expressions such as "honourable acquittal", "acquitted of blame" and "fully exonerated" are unknown to the Criminal Procedure Code. Therefore, the learned Judge felt that an authoritative pronouncement on this issue was needed from a Division Bench of this Court. Hence P.N. Prakash, J, passed an order on 01.04.2014, which reads as follows:

"4. I gave my anxious consideration to the arguments advanced by the learned counsel appearing for the revision petitioners. No judgment of the Hon'ble Apex Court has been placed before me in support of the contention of the revision petitioners that a criminal court can employ the expression "Honourable Acquittal" while acquitting the accused. Therefore, I am of the opinion that for an authoritative pronouncement on this aspect, it would be in the fitness of things to place the matter before a Division Bench.

5. Therefore, the Registry is directed to place these matters before The Hon'ble Administrative Judge for posting batch of cases before a Division Bench."

7. Therefore, these cases were placed before us for consideration of the question as to whether it is possible for a Court to recognize such distinctions and if they could, whether the Court can convert one form of acquittal into another form. All the learned counsel appearing for the petitioners focussed upon one thing namely that the Criminal Procedure Code, by itself, does not create any distinction between one form of acquittal and another form of acquittal. Section 232 of the Code speaks only of one acquittal, which reads as follows:-

"232. Acquittal.

If after taking the evidence for the prosecution, examining the accused and hearing the prosecution and the defence on the point, the Judge considers that there is no evidence that the accused committed the offence, the Judge shall record an order of acquittal."

8. Insofar as the cases instituted otherwise than on police report are concerned, Section 248 speaks about acquittal or conviction, which re