After Supreme Court Raised Concerns, UP Govt Proposes To Amend Law To Abate Trials For Motor Vehicle Offences

After the Supreme Court expressed concerns over the Uttar Pradesh law, which proposed to abate the trials for offences under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, pending till 2021, the Government proposed an amendment to the provision.

As per the proposed amendment, offences which are non-compoundable, or have mandatory imprisonment, or which are subsequent offences, will not be abated.

The issue is with respect to the Uttar Pradesh Criminal Law (Composition of Offences and Abatement of Trials) Act as per which the MV Act cases pending as on 31.12.2021 would stand abated.

In a hearing held in November last year, the Court had expressed concerns about the amendment, noting that even serious offences like drunken driving will also stand abated.

Following that, on January 22, the Uttar Pradesh Government, through Advocate Ruchira Goel, filed an affidavit stating that pursuant to the Court's last order, a meeting was convened and presided over by the Chief Secretary of the Government of Uttar Pradesh, in which the issue was deliberated. An amendment was proposed on January 9 under Section 9 of the UP Composition of Offences Act, which would read: 

"Section 9: Notwithstanding anything contained in any other law for the time being in force: (1) The trial of an accused for – (a) an offence punishable under- (i) the Motor Vehicles Act 1988... (proposed amendment would be that offences which are non-compoundable, or offences which are punishable with mandatory imprisonment or offences which are subsequent offences would not abate at all, only other offences that do not fall in the aforesaid 3 categories would abate);...... pending before a Magistrate on the date of commencement of this Act from before December 31, 2021 shall not abate” 

However, amicus and Senior Advocate Gaurav Agarwal submitted that the amendment would not serve the purpose, and the UP Composition of Offences Act needs to be held ultra vires, being repugnant to the provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act.

But the Court said it wants to see if the amendment makes the provisions workable. "Having heard the learned Amicus and other learned counsel appearing in this litigation, we are of the view that the State of Uttar Pradesh should proceed further to undertake the necessary amendment in accordance with law. Let the amendment come into force. We keep the issue as regards declaring the UP Act No. 4 of 2023 as ultra vires open to be argued further."

A bench comprising Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice KV Viswanathan has given six weeks for the Uttar Pradesh Government to effectuate the amendment.

Case Details:S.RAJASEEKARAN v. UNION OF INDIA AND ORS. & ORS.|Writ Petition(s)(Civil) No(s). 295/2012

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Appearances: For Petitioner(s) : Mr. Krishna Kumar, AOR Mr. Vinodh Kanna B, Adv. Mr. Sunil Ahya, Adv. Mr. Anil Kumar, AOR

For Respondent(s) : Mr. Vikramjit Bannerjee, A.S.G. Mr. Raj Bahadur Yadav, AOR Mr. Sharath Nambiar, Adv. Mr. Sabrish Subramanium, Adv. Mr. Debojit Borkakati, Adv. Ms. Tusharika Sharma, Adv. Mr. Vikramjit Banerjee, A.S.G. Mr. Sharath Nambiar, Adv. Mr. B.k.satija, Adv. Mr. T.s.sabarish, Adv. Mr. Debojit Borkakati, Adv. Mr. Jagdish Chandra, Adv. Mr. Sudarshan Lamba, AOR

Mr. Viresh B. Saharya, AOR Mr. Merusagar Samantaray, AOR Mr. Kanishk, Adv. Ms. Ayushi Upadhaya, Adv. Mr. Anurag Yadav, Adv. Ms. Tharani S Sre, Adv. Ms. Ankita Chaudhary, AOR Mr. Shreyas Balaji, Adv. Mr. Chand Kapoor, Adv. Ms. Shirin Khajuria, Sr. Adv. Ms. Swati Tiwari, Adv. Mr. Gopal, Adv. Mr. Rajan Narain, AOR Ms. K. Enatoli Sema, AOR Mr. Amit Kumar Singh, Adv. Ms. Chubalemla Chang, Adv. Mr. Prang Newmai, Adv. Ms. Yanmi Phazang,, Adv. Mr. Anando Mukherjee, AOR

Mr. Aravindh S., AOR Mr. Akshay Gupta, Adv. Ms. Anika Bansal, Adv. Mr. Gaurav Agrawal, Sr. Adv., Amicus Curiae Mr. Ravi Raghunath, AOR Mr. Nakul Patwardhan, Adv. Ms. Kaarunya Lakshmi, Adv. Ms. Sejal Jain, Adv. M/S. Arputham Aruna And Co, AOR Ms. Aishwarya Bhati, A.S.G. Mr. Mukesh Kumar Maroria, AOR Ms. Sunita Sharma, Adv. Mr. Ishaan Sharma, Adv. Mr. Annirudh Sharma Ii, Adv. Mr. Jagdish Chandra Solanki, Adv. Mr. Amit Anand Tiwari, Sr. A.A.G. Mr. Sabarish Subramanian, AOR Mr. Vishnu Unnikrishnan, Adv. Ms. Jahnavi Taneja, Adv.

 Mr. Sumit Gupta, Adv. Ms. Jaikriti S. Jadeja, AOR Mr. Akshay Kumar Tiwari, Adv Ms. Tanya Shrotriya, Adv. Mr. Hardik Choudhary, Adv. Ms. Rashmi Nandakumar, AOR Mr. Kunal Mimani, AOR Mr. Parag Chaturvedi, Adv. Mr. D. K. Devesh, AOR Mr. Shuvodeep Roy, AOR Mr. Deepayan Dutta, Adv. Mr. Saurabh Tripathi, Adv. Ms. Deepanwita Priyanka, AOR Mr. Satyalipsu Ray, Adv. Mr. Prashant Bhagwati, Adv. Ms. Priyal Sheth, Adv. Mr. Raghvendra Kumar, AOR Mr. Divyanshu Kumar Srivastava, AOR Mr. Shivam Nagpal, Adv. Mr. Pukhrambam Ramesh Kumar, AOR Mr. Karun Sharma, Adv. Ms. Anupama Ngangom, Adv. Ms. Rajkumari Divyasana, Adv.

Ms. Ruchira Gupta, Adv. Mr. Shishir Deshpande, AOR Ms. Pooja Tripathi, Adv. Mr. Mohtisham Ali, Adv. Mr. Areen Gulati, Adv. Ms. Devina Sehgal, AOR Mr. Srikanth Varma Mudunuru, Adv. Mr. V. Shyamohan, AOR Mr. Sanjay Jain, AOR  Mr. Pranaya Kumar Mohapatra, AOR Mr. Satyajeet Kumar, AOR Ms. Astha Sharma, AOR Mr. Rajat Bhardwaj, A.A.G. Ms. Baani Khanna, AOR Mr. Robin Singh, Adv. Mr. Kapil Balwani, Adv. Ms. Komal Thakkar, Adv. Mr. Santosh Kumar - I, AOR Mr. Pradeep Misra, AOR

Mr. Shantanu Sagar, AOR Mr. Sunny Choudhary, AOR Mr. Nitin Lonkar, Adv. Mr. Siddharth Dharmadhikari, Adv. Mr. Aaditya Aniruddha Pande, AOR Mr. Shrirang B. Varma, Adv. Ms. Swati Ghildiyal, AOR Ms. Neha Singh, Adv. Mr. Udit Dedhiya, Adv Mr. V. N. Raghupathy, AOR Mr. Apurva Sachdev, Adv. Ms. Mythili S. Adv.

Mr. Nishe Rajen Shonker, AOR Ms. Anu K Joy, Adv. Mr. Alim Anvar, Adv. Mr. Santhosh K, Adv. Mrs. Devika A.l., Adv Mr. Guntur Pramod Kumar, AOR Ms. Prerna Singh, Adv. Mr. Samarth Krishan Luthra, Adv. Mr. Dhruv Yadav, Adv. Ms. Savita Singh, AOR Mr. M. P. Vinod, AOR Mr. Kishan Chand Jain, Adv. Mr. Rajesh Kumar, Adv. Mr. Ashwini Kumar, Adv. Mr. Sidhant Sahay, Adv. Mr. E. C. Agrawala, AOR

Mr. Vikramjit Banerjee, A.S.G. Mr. Mrinal Elkar Mazumdar, Adv. Mr. Neeraj Kumar Sharma, Adv. Ms. Indira Bhakar, Adv. Mr. Mukesh Kumar Verma, Adv. Mr. Harish Pandey, Adv. Mr. Shashwat Parihar, Adv. Mr. Kanu Agarwal, Adv. Mr. Varun Chugh, Adv. Mr. Bhuvan Kapur, Adv. Mr. Vinayak Sharma, Adv. Mr. Piyush Beriwal, Adv. Mr. Apoorv Kurup, Adv. Mr. Krishna Kant Dubey, Adv. Mr. Santosh Ramdurg, Adv.

Mr. Shreekant Neelappa Terdal, AOR Mr. Azmat Hayat Amanullah, AOR Ms. Vanshita Gupta, Adv. Mr. Tejasvi Kumar Sharma, Adv. Mr. Sameer Abhyankar, AOR Mr. Rahul Kumar, Adv. Mr. Aakash Thakur, Adv. Mr. Neeraj Shekhar, AOR Mr. Rajesh Maurya, Adv. Mr. Ujjwal Ashutosh, Adv. Mr. Saroj Kumar Singh, Adv. Mr. Rajat Singh Chandel, Adv. Ms. Ruchira Goel, AOR Ms. Ritika Rao, Adv. Mr. Sharanya, Adv. Ms. Ayushi Srivastava, Adv. Mr. Vivek Kishore, AOR Ms. Tulika Mukherjee, AOR Mr. Avijit Mani Tripathi, AOR Ms. Tarini Kamakhy Nayak, Adv. Mr. Amit Kumar Chawla, Adv. Mr. Hitesh Kumar Sharma, Adv. Mr. Akhileshwar Jha, Adv. Mr. Desh Pal Singh, Adv. Mr. Anupam Kumar, Adv.Mr. Raghvendra P. Singh, Adv. Mr. Santosh Kumar, AOR Mr. Samar Vijay Singh, AOR Mr. Aman Dev Sharma, Adv. Ms. Sabarni Som, Adv. Mr. Gaj Singh, Adv