NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday passed a slew of directions in the suo motu criminal writ petition of 2021 concerning the strategy for granting bail, as it held that the states and union territories had an obligation to consider the premature release of all convicts and it was not necessary for them to apply for permanent remission.Earlier some states, on the pretext of the accused not filing the appeal, has unnecessarily delayed bail or remission and certain pleas of the accused.A bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan directed states and union territories not having a remission policy under Section 432 of the CrPC or Section 473 of the BNSS to formulate a policy within two months.The top court, while going one step further, in favour of the accused persons, held that without hearing the accused, remission cannot be cancelled by the state.The two-judge Bench added that remission of a convict’s sentence should not require an application from the accused, as the State must consider such cases suo motu.”The remission cannot be revoked arbitrarily without proper reasoning and due process,” the top court said, adding that it will later assess their implementation by the authorities.
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