We all might have an idea on the level of complications our law possess. Be it in terms of passing a judgment, making a law or amending it, it is no easy task to deal or understand anything about the World’s largest democracy.
In this tidy process of interpreting the Constitution, there are lot many possibilities of acknowledging ourselves lost in between. The idea of lifetime imprisonment is certainly one of them, in general, we have noticed an imposition on the convict saying, “court passed a lifetime imprisonment”, well, this line simply takes us to assume that he/she will be jailed for straight 14 years.
If that is what you thought, then according to the apex court’s verdict on the ‘lifetime imprisonment’ act, you’re utterly misled. It might be movies or stories we heard of that gave us a misconception to believe that the lifetime imprisonment lasts for only 14 years.
However, to clear the air of ambiguity on this, we have to walk through the quotations made by the Supreme Court. Explaining the same, popular Advocate Virag Gupta has said that there is no mention in the Indian Constitution on limiting the punishment to 14 years.
Back in 2012, Supreme Court clarified that Lifelong imprisonment means a jail sentence of a lifetime. The apex court had announced: “It appears to us there is a misconception that a prisoner serving a life sentence has an indefeasible right to be released on completion of either fourteen years or twenty years imprisonment. The prisoner has no such right.”
Some misconceptions prevailed in India like Life term Imprisonment means jail for 14 years or 20 years. A minimum of 14 years is set as the lower limit for the life imprisonment. A convict will have to spend atleast 14 years in prison if he/she has been punished with life imprisonment.
Out of our practical experiences, another doubt might pop up inside our brains that how do prisoners get released after 14 years when lifetime imprisonment literally means a lifetime (till death).
Supreme Court has an explanation for this, it says that after a convict is given lifetime imprisonment, he is under the custody of state government and they carry the responsibility of his lifetime jail term execution. Only state government decides whether the convict will leave the jail after 14 years, 20 years, 30 years or he will stay there for a lifetime.
This release is based on the prisoner’s mindset, health and family situations during the conviction. However, a minimum 14 years of jail is compulsory for the convict charged with lifetime imprisonment and he cannot come out of the jail in any case before that particular period.
In its statement, the apex court further said, “In the case of a convict undergoing life imprisonment, he will be in custody for an indeterminate period. Therefore, remissions earned by or awarded to such a life convict are only notional. In his case, to reduce the period of incarceration, a specific order under Section 432 of the CrPC will have to be passed by the appropriate government. However, the reduced period cannot be less than 14 years as per Section 433-A of the CrPC.”
So, this term “lifetime imprisonment” has its actual meaning which we’re barely aware of.