What this judgment does NOT decide: it does not acquit the appellant, does not reduce either life sentence, and does not merge the two sentences into one — both life sentences stand, superimposed, so that remission or commutation of one does not by itself remit the other.
- Case
- Raju Shantaram Koli v. State of Maharashtra
- Court
- Supreme Court of India
- Decision
- Citation
- 2026 INSC 1161
- Bench
- K. V. Viswanathan; Arun Palli
- Judgment by
- K. V. Viswanathan
- Case numbers
- Criminal Appeal No. 5072 of 2026; Criminal Appeal No. 5073 of 2026
- Outcome
- Final judgment partly allowing the appeal arising out of Diary No. 49371 of 2026 and disposing of the appeal arising out of Special Leave Petition (Crl.) No. 8535 of 2025 as infructuous; the convictions and the remaining part of the trial court's operative order stand.
What the Court decided
On 27 October 2026, the Supreme Court partly allowed the criminal appeal arising out of Diary No. 49371 of 2026 and set aside the direction that Raju Shantaram Koli's two life sentences run consecutively. The appeal arising out of Special Leave Petition (Criminal) No. 8535 of 2025 was disposed of as having become infructuous, because the diary appeal decided the consecutive-sentences issue.
The net result is that the direction in the trial court's judgment dated 27 September 2013 in Sessions Trial No. 282 of 2010, as confirmed by the High Court, to the effect that the substantive sentences awarded to the accused “shall run consecutively, one after other, and not concurrently”, stands set aside. The remaining part of the operative order in paragraph 86 of the trial court's judgment, as affirmed by the High Court, is maintained.
How the sentencing dispute arose
The appeal arising out of Special Leave Petition (Criminal) No. 8535 of 2025 challenged a judgment and order dated 13 January 2025 of a Division Bench of the High Court of Judicature at Bombay in Criminal Writ Petition No. 842 of 2024. By that writ petition, the appellant had prayed that the imprisonment for life awarded to him in Sessions Trial No. 282 of 2010, for offences under Sections 302 and 376 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, be directed to run concurrently. The High Court disposed of the writ petition by holding that a writ court cannot review the judgment and order dated 10 June 2016 passed by a coordinate Bench, and left it open to the appellant to challenge the sentence before the appropriate court, as may be maintainable in law. In that 10 June 2016 appeal judgment, the High Court had expressly noticed that the trial court had imposed consecutive sentences and that it would not like to interfere with the same.
The diary appeal raised only the limited issue of the correctness of imposing consecutive sentences. The Court noted at the outset that the appellant had been in jail throughout, condoned the delay, and granted leave in both matters.
The trial court's judgment in Sessions Trial No. 282 of 2010 was dated 27 September 2013, and its operative direction was confirmed by the High Court in Criminal Appeal No. 975 of 2014, whose judgment the diary appeal, in substance, challenged on the consecutive-sentences point.
The question before the Court
The question before the Court was whether the trial court as well as the High Court were justified in imposing consecutive life sentences in a single trial for offences under Section 302 and Section 376 read with Section 342 of the Indian Penal Code.
Because the appellant had separately challenged the High Court's judgment by special leave, and the Court had condoned the delay and admitted the special leave petition, the Court said it was not required to decide the question arising in the first matter, namely whether a writ court could have passed an order for concurrent sentences. The diary appeal, which directly raised the consecutive-sentences question, was the vehicle for deciding it.
The Muthuramalingam rule: one life, so no consecutive life terms
The issue had already been answered by a Constitution Bench in Muthuramalingam v. State, (2016) 8 SCC 313. That decision held that imprisonment for life is a sentence for the remainder of the life of the offender, unless the remaining sentence is commuted or remitted by the competent authority. Section 31 of the CrPC must therefore be interpreted consistently with that basic tenet: it permits consecutive running of sentences only where the sentences do not happen to be life sentences. Where sentences include imprisonment for life, they can and must run concurrently in the sense explained in that decision.
The logic, as quoted by the Court, is that a direction requiring an offender to undergo imprisonment for life twice over would be anomalous and irrational, because it disregards the fact that humans have but one life to live. Parliament, the Constitution Bench noted, recognised the same anomaly in Section 427(2) of the CrPC, which carves out an exception for life sentences for two distinct offences separately tried and held proved; that logic extends to Section 31 as well, even though Section 31 does not contain an analogous provision in terms. Awarding multiple life sentences is therefore different from directing them to run consecutively: the former is permissible, the latter is not.
The Court restated the correct position for this case: life sentences awarded for multiple offences in a single trial cannot be directed to run consecutively, but such sentences are superimposed over each other, so that any remission or commutation granted by the competent authority in respect of one does not, by itself, result in remission of the sentence awarded for the other.
What happens to the sentences now
The impugned order, to the extent it upholds the life sentence for the offence under Section 302 and the life sentence for the offences under Section 376 read with Section 342 running consecutively, is set aside. In its place, the Court directed, in accordance with Muthuramalingam, that the two life sentences be superimposed over each other, so that any remission or commutation granted in respect of one does not, by itself, result in remission of the other.
Nothing in the judgment disturbs the convictions themselves or the remaining part of the trial court's operative order. The appellant therefore continues to serve life imprisonment, but under superimposed rather than consecutive life sentences, with remission and commutation assessed sentence by sentence.
BANTHRY ANALYSISFor law students
The exam-ready distinction is between awarding and running: a court can award a life sentence for each offence punishable with life imprisonment, but it cannot direct those life sentences to run one after the other, because a person has only one life to serve. Superimposition is the middle path the Constitution Bench chose: both sentences exist, but they overlap, and remission is sentence-specific.
Pair this case with Sections 31 and 427(2) of the CrPC. Section 31 governs consecutive and concurrent sentences generally; Section 427(2) already prevents consecutive life sentences for separately tried offences. Muthuramalingam reads the same anti-anomaly logic into Section 31 for a single trial. If a question asks whether consecutive life sentences are ever possible, the answer from this line of authority is no — while consecutive fixed-term sentences remain possible under Section 31.
READING PROMPTSQuestions for a closer reading
- Why can a court award multiple life sentences but not direct them to run consecutively?
- What does it mean for two life sentences to be superimposed, and how does that affect remission or commutation?
- Why did the Court not need to decide whether a writ court could order concurrent sentences in the first appeal?
