' Muhammad Asghar petitioner was tried under section 411, P. P. C. By Mr. M. Junaid, Magistrate First Class, Lahore, who vide his judgment dated 15th June, 1966, found him guilty of the said offence and sentenced him to nine months' R. I. Aggrieved against his conviction and sentence, he filed an appeal before the learned Additional Sessions Judge, Lahore, who vide his judgment dated 15-8- 1966, while dismissing his appeal, reduced the sentence of the petitioner from nine months' R. I. To six months' R. I.
2. Hence, this revision petition which was admitted on 5-10-1966 by a Judge of this Court and the petitioner was released on bail. It is for the first time after eleven years that this case has been put up before me for adjudication.
3. The brief facts of the case are that Suba complainant lost his buffalo which was at the stage of advance pregnancy but no case was registered with the police. However, after three months of said theft, C. I. A. Staff raided the village of the petitioner and while rounding up a number of heads of cattle, also recovered from the possession of the petitioner a buffalo along-with a calf which was not claimed by him to be his property. Suba complainant alongwith others were called by the police to identify the subject-matter of theft (animals so rounded and recovered by the police) and Suba complainant was able to identify his buffalo, found in the possession of the petitioner. A case was registered after the recovery was effected at the instance of Suba P. W. And during the course of investigation Suba P. W. Produced receipt Exh. P. C. To show that the buffalo in question was purchased by him from Muhammad Rafiq P. W.
5.
4. I have heard the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner as well as the learned counsel for the State and have perused the record of this case carefully with their assistance.
Without going into the merits of the case, learned counsel for the petitioner has submitted that this occurrence took place eleven years earlier and for that reason the petitioner went through a protracted trial and was ultimately convicted. According to the learned counsel, the record of the case reveals that he has suffered about two months imprisonment out of the substantive sentence of six months in jail when he was ultimately released on bail by this Court. It has been submitted that if his bail application would not have been accepted and he would have been asked to undergo the entire sentence, the total sentence which would have been suffered by him would not be more than four months, as the remissions would have been awarded to him under the normal rules of the jail. It has been prayed that the ends of justice would be adequately met if the sentence of the petitioner is reduced to the period already undergone by him as by this time the petitioner has settled in his life as a peaceful citizen and has never been prosecuted for any other offence of this nature so far.
5. I have given my anxious thought to the contentions raised by the learned counsel for the petitioner and find them forceful. It is a known principle of Jurisprudence that the laws are made to assist the society and to create fear in the minds of people suffering from criminal propensities as a deterrent to avoid commission of offences by them. If a person who has once suffered from propensity of this nature and has suffered for that reason, it would be great hardship if he is once again asked to serve the remaining part of his sentence, after a lapse of ten years keeping in view the fact that he has been living throughout this period as a peaceful citizen. In case the rigour of the law is enforced, the members of the society among whom he lives, would have a notion whether right or wrong that the life of a person has been disturbed after a period of eleven years.
This would create a prejudice in their mind against the law although based on a wrong notion.
6. In view of the above I am of the considered opinion that in the instant case the ends of justice have stood adequately met by the punishment which this man has undergone.
7. The result is that while dismissing the revision and maintaining the conviction of the petitioner, I reduce his sentence to the period already undergone by him. Since, the petitioner is on bail, he will stand discharged of his bail bonds.