Cuttack: The Orissa High Court on Monday suspended the execution of life sentence that had been imposed on former Chhatrapur MLA Nagireddy Narayan Reddy for his alleged role in the death of a police inspector.
Inspector Binoba Meher of the reserve police was killed on June 18, 1998, when an unidentified person hurled a bomb while he was on duty.
During the mishap, Meher was posted at Sindhigaon monitoring potential law and order problems resulting from demonstrations against land acquisition for a Tata Steel facility.
Under section 302 of the IPC, at least 22 persons—including CPI leader Reddy—were listed as defendants and charged with murder.
On July 31, 2023, the court of additional district judge-cum-special judge for MPs and MLAs had sentenced Reddy and 12 others to life imprisonment for the death of Meher.
Reddy and two other convicts in the case filed criminal appeal in the high court challenging their conviction. They also sought suspension of execution of the sentence imposed on them.
The division bench of Justice Debabrata Dash and Justice V Narasingh suspended the execution of the life sentence ‘taking into account the submissions, the impugned judgment and the happening in the incident including the role of the appellants as those emanate from the evidence and also the surrounding circumstances’.
Consequently, November 5 was set as the next date for the appeal hearing by the bench, which also ordered that “further execution of the sentence imposed upon the appellants (Reddy and two others) by the trial court shall remain suspended pending disposal of the appeal.”
In addition to providing the relief, the bench ordered Reddy and the other two appellants to be released on bail under whatever terms and circumstances the trial court would find appropriate .
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