Punjab and Haryana High Court: In a petition filed by the petitioner under Section 482 of Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 seeking anticipatory bail, apprehending her arrest in the FIR registered under Sections 4091, 4202, 4653, 4664, 4685, 4716, 120-B7 of the Penal Code, 1860 and Sections 13(1)(a), 13(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 2018, Anoop Chitkara, J., opined that before proceeding to adjudicate the bail, the scope of writing the abbreviation of the three newly enacted criminal laws should be found out. The Court stated that condensing the titles of new criminal laws into abbreviation would help standardize the terms in a manner that could be universally understood without grappling with linguistic competence. These were likely to reduce the cognitive load on readers by making the text more scannable, accessible to the process, and compared to the Hindi pronunciation, it was straightforward to pronounce. The Court stated that adopting abbreviations for the new criminal laws would simplify the usage of lengthy Hindi terminology and also, promote inclusivity, facilitating a more accessible and efficient judicial process. Thus, there was nothing wrong if in the FIR, Petitions, orders, etc., referred the new law in abbreviated form, respectively.
The Court stated that the perusal of the petition revealed that ‘Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023’ was mentioned in the petition as ‘Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (‘BNSS’)’. The Court stated that before proceeding to adjudicate the bail, the scope of writing the abbreviation of Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 as ‘BNSS’ and Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, and Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 as ‘BNS’ and ‘BSA’, respectively should be found out.
The Court stated that a fad for brevity and convenience of usage led to the truncation and conciseness of long words, which further led to the ever-increasing trend of abbreviations and their species of initialisms and acronyms. The Court stated that creating a shared linguistic space for people with different language backgrounds becomes crucial to fostering a sense of unity and inclusivity. The hard-to-pronounce titles cause lingual impediment, cognitive chaos, and tedium that could prevent the legal system from operating smoothly.
Further, the Court stated that we, the people of India, respect the mutual co-existence of Hindi and non-Hindi speakers and acknowledge the inevitable discomfort for the latter to pronounce difficult Hindi names. Various political parties in India, with long names, like AIMIM, BJP, DMK, JDU, TDP etc., were widely recognized by their abbreviated/initialized forms, irrespective of the languages in which their names were composed.
The Court stated that condensing the titles of new criminal laws into BNS, BNSS, and BSA would help standardize the terms in a manner that could be universally understood without grappling with linguistic competence. These were likely to reduce the cognitive load on readers by making the text more scannable, accessible to the process, and compared to the Hindi pronunciation, it was straightforward to pronounce. The Court stated that adopting abbreviations for the new criminal laws would simplify the usage of lengthy Hindi terminology and promote inclusivity, facilitating a more accessible and efficient judicial process. Thus, there was nothing wrong if in the FIR, Petitions, orders, etc., referred the new law as BNSS, BNS, BSA, respectively.
Further, regarding bail, the petitioner had contended that the petitioner should be granted bail, since almost all similarly placed persons had been granted bail by this Court on their deposit of the entire compensation amount that they have received on account of fruit trees, and the petitioner was also entitled to the same relief on the principles of parity. Thus, the Court stated that the petitioner was also entitled to bail on the principles of parity with similarly placed co-accused. The bail was subject to the condition that the Investigator returns the entire compensation amount that was received for plantation of guava trees in the acquired land in the shape of FDR(s), to the petitioner, and the same should be deposited with the Chief Judicial Magistrate concerned, and the copy of the order qua mentioning deposit should be handed over to the Investigator on or before 31-07-2024.
Thus, without commencing on the case’s merits, the Court stated that the petitioner made a case for bail, subject to Section 485(4), 486, 491 and 492 of BNS, and the terms and conditions on bail bonds, to the satisfaction of the Arresting Officer/ Investigator or the Court concerned, whichever was applicable.
[Manpreet Kaur v. State of Punjab, 2024 SCC OnLine P&H 7800, decided on 19-07-2024]
Advocates who appeared in this case :
For the Petitioner: Randhir Singh Manhas, Advocate.
For the Respondent: Anurag Chopra, Addl. AG, Punjab, Gurpartap S. Bhullar, A.A.G., Punjab, Sukhdev Singh, AAG, Punjab and Swati Batra, DAG Punjab.
Buy Penal Code, 1860 HERE
1. Section 316(5) of Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS)
