Legal Aid - Advocate Appointed To Represent Accused Should Be Given Reasonable Time To Go Through File & Get Ready : Supreme Court

The Supreme Court observed that a legal-aid advocate appointed to represent the accused should be given reasonable time to go through the file and get ready to assist the Court.

The object of appointing an advocate to espouse the cause of the appellant who was unrepresented was to ensure that justice is done to him, the bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Pankaj Mithal said.

In this case, the accused was convicted in a murder case. In appeal, the High Court appointed an empaneled advocate to espouse the cause of the appellant-accused. The High Court did not grant time to the advocate to prepare herself and decided the appeal on the same day on which the advocate was appointed.

"It was a duty of the Court to give a reasonable time to the advocate appointed to go through the file and get ready to assist the Court. Apart from adopting the submissions made by the co-accused, it appears that the advocate appointed to espouse the cause of the appellant made a submission that the appellant did not share common intention to commit the murder with the co-accused. The very fact that such submission is made shows that the advocate was not ready with the matter, as there was no conviction of the appellant with the aid of Section 34 of the IPC. Obviously, the advocate was not aware that Section 34 of the IPC was not invoked by the Trial Court and therefore, she has argued as if the appellant was convicted with the aid of Section 34 of the IPC. This happened obviously because the appointed advocate was not given time to prepare herself.", the Apex Court observed.

The court therefore remanded the appeal to High Court for fresh consideration.

Niranjan Das @ Niru Das @ Mahanto vs State of WB | 2023 LiveLaw (SC) 732 | 2023 INSC 780

Legal aid - An advocate appointed to represent the accused should be given reasonable time to go through the file and get ready to assist the Court - The object of appointing an advocate to espouse the cause of the appellant who was unrepresented was to ensure that justice is done to him.

Click here to Read/Download Judgment