Legal provisions regarding summary procedure for trial for giving false evidence under section 344 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.
It is desirable to have some provisions whereby perjury of a flagrant and unchallengeable type could be effectively punished summarily without prejudicing a fair trial of the accused person.
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Section 344 of the Code provides the following provisions of summary procedure for giving false evidence.
(1) If, at the time of delivery of any judgment of final order disposing of any judicial proceeding, a Court of Session or Magistrate of the first class express an opinion to the effect that any witness appearing in such proceeding had knowingly or willfully given false evidence or had fabricated false evidence with the intention that such evidence should be used in such proceeding, it or he may, ii satisfied that it is necessary and expedient in the interest of justice that the witness should be tried summarily for giving or fabricating, as the case may be, false evidence, take cognizance of the offence and may, after giving the offender a reasonable opportunity of showing cause why he should not be punished for such offence, try such offender summarily and sentence him to imprisonment for a term which may extend to three months, or to fine which may extend to five hundred rupees, or with both.
(2) In every such case the Court shall follow, as nearly as may be practicable, the procedure prescribed for summary trials.
(3) Nothing in Section 344 shall affect the power of the Court to make a complaint under Section 340 for the offence, where it does not choose to proceed under Section 344.
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(4) Where, after any action is initiated under Section 344(1), it is made to appear to the Court of Session or Magistrate of the first class that an appeal or an application for revision has been preferred or filed against the judgment or order in which the opinion referred to in Section 344(1) has been expressed, it or he shall stay further proceedings of the trial under the disposal of the appeal or the application for revision, as the case may be, and thereupon the further proceedings of the trial shall abide by the results of the appeal or application for revision.
The summary procedure mentioned in Section 344 is discretionary only. The order of conviction the sentence passed under Section 344 has been specifically made appealable under Section 351.