Concurrent sentencing is exceptional: later terms run together only for connected offences or to prevent injustice.

Concurrent sentencing must ordinarily be decided when the later conviction and sentence are recorded, because once judgment is signed and pronounced the court cannot revisit that direction under Section 397(1). The inherent power under Section 561-A may be used only in exceptional cases to give effect to the Code, prevent abuse of process, or secure the ends of justice, and not to defeat the statutory scheme. Concurrency is justified only where the offences are connected or where failure to consider the issue would cause injustice; distinct and unrelated offences should normally run consecutively. On the facts, the applications failed because the convictions arose from separate and unconnected offences.

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Issues: (i) Whether the court that decided an appeal can, after signing and pronouncing its judgment, direct under Section 397(1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1898 that the sentence on a subsequent conviction shall run concurrently with the previous sentence; (ii) whether the High Court can invoke Section 561-A of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1898 to direct concurrency of sentences after the stage for exercise of power under Section 397(1) is over; and (iii) in what circumstances the sentence on a subsequent conviction should be made concurrent with the previous sentence.

Issue (i): Whether the court that decided an appeal can, after signing and pronouncing its judgment, direct under Section 397(1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1898 that the sentence on a subsequent conviction shall run concurrently with the previous sentence.

Analysis: Section 397(1) creates an exception to the general rule that a later sentence begins after the earlier sentence ends, but the discretion to direct concurrency must be exercised when the subsequent conviction and sentence are being recorded. Once judgment is signed, Section 369 bars alteration or review except for clerical correction, and appellate judgments are final under Section 430. The direction as to whether sentences run concurrently or consecutively is an integral part of the judgment and cannot be altered thereafter.

Conclusion: The court that has signed and pronounced its judgment is not competent to invoke Section 397(1) thereafter to direct concurrency of sentences.

Issue (ii): Whether the High Court can invoke Section 561-A of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1898 to direct concurrency of sentences after the stage for exercise of power under Section 397(1) is over.

Analysis: The inherent power under Section 561-A is available only to give effect to orders under the Code, prevent abuse of process, or secure the ends of justice, and cannot be used where the Code expressly or by necessary implication prohibits the proposed action. It may be exercised in exceptional cases, but not to do what the Code forbids. Where the omission to direct concurrency is apparent and intervention is necessary to prevent injustice, the power may be used; otherwise it cannot override the statutory scheme.

Conclusion: The High Court may, in an appropriate exceptional case, use Section 561-A to direct concurrency even after Section 397(1) stage is over, but only to secure the ends of justice, prevent abuse of process, or give effect to an order under the Code.

Issue (iii): In what circumstances the sentence on a subsequent conviction should be made concurrent with the previous sentence.

Analysis: Concurrency is not to be ordered as a matter of course. It is proper where separate trials concern offences that are inherently or intimately connected, or where the earlier conviction and sentence were brought to the notice of the later court and the court, by oversight, failed to apply its mind to the discretion conferred by law. Where the offences are distinct and unconnected, the normal rule of consecutive operation should apply, and inherent power should be used sparingly only when justice so requires.

Conclusion: Concurrency is justified only on sound judicial principle in connected cases or where failure to consider the issue would cause injustice; it is not warranted for distinct and unrelated offences.

Final Conclusion: The applications failed because the applicants' convictions arose out of separate and unconnected offences, and no ground existed for the extraordinary exercise of inherent power to make the sentences run concurrently.

Ratio Decidendi: The discretion to order concurrent sentences must be exercised at the stage of conviction and sentencing, and after judgment is signed it cannot ordinarily be revisited under Section 397(1); Section 561-A may be used only exceptionally where justice, prevention of abuse of process, or effectuation of the Code so requires.

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