Supreme held as follows which shows the importance of filing a Discharge petition u/s 239 CrPC (or 227/245 CrPC, as the case may be) since without such petition, Magistrate is free to skip applying his/her judicial mind on the said sections and proceed with charge framing, unrestricted and he/she is not bound to record reasons for charge framing.
We wish to point out that if the trial court decides to frame a charge there is no legal requirement that he should pass an order specifying the reasons as to why he opts to do so. Framing of charge itself is prima facie order that the trial judge has formed the opinion, upon consideration of the police report and other documents and after hearing both sides, that there is ground for presuming that the accused has committed the offence concerned.
And then,
Kanti Bhadra Shah and Anr Vs State of West Bengal on 5 January 2000If there is no legal requirement that the trial court should write an order showing the reasons for framing a charge, why should the already burdened trial Courts be further burdened with such an extra work. The time has reached to adopt all possible measures to expedite the the court procedures and to chalk out measures to avert all roadblocks causing avoidable delays. If a Magistrate is to write detailed orders at different stages merely because the counsel would address arguments at all stages, the snail paced progress of proceedings in trial courts would further be slowed down. We are coming across interlocutory orders of Magistrates and Sessions Judges running into several pages. We can appreciate if such a detailed order has been passed for culminating the proceedings before them. But it is quite unnecessary to write detailed orders at other stages, such as issuing process, remanding the accused to custody, framing of charges, passing over to next stage in the trial. It is a salutary guideline that when orders rejecting or granting bail are passed, the Court should avoid expressing one way or other on contentious issues, except in cases such as those falling within Section 37 of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985.
Citations: [2000 SLT 1 133], [2000 RCR CRI 1 407], [2000 CRLJ 0 746], [2000 SCC 1 722], [2000 SUPREME 1 6], [2000 AIR SC 522], [2000 AIR SC 0 52], [2000 JT 1 13], [2000 CALCRILR 0 151], [2000 CRIMES 1 96], [2000 CCR 1 72], [2000 KERLT 1 795], [2000 RCR CRIMINAL 1 407], [2000 SCALE 1 19], [2000 SCC CR 303], [2000 SCJ 3 77], [2000 SRJ 2 112], [2000 ALD CRI 1 421], [2000 CRLR 173], [2000 MLJ CRI 1 243], [2000 MAHLR 2 534], [2000 SCC CRI 303], [2000 CRI LJ 746]
Other Source links: https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1735113/ or https://www.casemine.com/judgement/in/5609ad74e4b01497114117a5
Index of Discharge Judgments u/s 239 are here.
