Cannot jail cheque bounce convict beyond six months for default in payment of fine: Karnataka High Court

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The High Court of Karnataka has ordered the release of a convict serving a sentence for default in payment of fines in cheque bounce cases, holding that he cannot be made to undergo more than one-fourth of the maximum two-year sentence prescribed for the offence, as he had already spent over six months in prison for non-payment.

Justice M. Nagaprasanna passed the order allowing the petition filed by a 53-year-old man who had been sentenced by the trial court to three months’ imprisonment in each of three cheque dishonour cases for default in paying the fines imposed upon his conviction.

The cases pertained to the dishonour of three cheques issued by him towards repayment of a loan from a private financial company. The trial court, while convicting the petitioner, had sentenced him to pay fines totalling over ₹11 crore, with three months’ simple imprisonment in default of payment in each case. As the petitioner did not pay the fine even two years after the trial court’s order of conviction, and had expressed his inability to pay the amount, he was taken into judicial custody to serve a total sentence of nine months for default in payment of the fine.

However, the High Court held that the default imprisonment imposed on the petitioner could not exceed one-fourth of the maximum punishment prescribed for the offence, as mandated under Section 65 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and its successor provision, Section 8(3) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).

Since the offence under Section 138 of the NI Act carries a maximum punishment of two years, the High Court ruled that the default sentence could not exceed six months per case. Observing that the petitioner had already undergone over six months’ imprisonment, the High Court held that continued incarceration would violate statutory safeguards as well as constitutional protections under Article 21.

Meanwhile, the High Court clarified that proceedings initiated against the petitioner under Section 421(1) of the Code of Criminal Pr