Maharashtra: Court orders brawl case convict to plant trees, offer Namaz 5 times daily instead of imprisonment

A court at Malegaon in Maharashtra's Nashik district has convicted a Muslim man in a case of road accident brawl but instead of imprisonment, it has ordered him to plant two trees and offer namaz (prayers) five times a day for 21 days.

Magistrate Tejwant Singh Sandhu in the order passed on February 27 noted that provisions of the Probation of Offenders Act granted powers to a magistrate to release a convict after admonition or appropriate warning to ensure he or she does not repeat the offence.

The court said in the present case, mere warning would not be sufficient and it is important the convict remembers his conviction so that he does not repeat it.

"According to me, giving appropriate warning means, to give an understanding that the crime had been committed, the accused has been proven guilty and he remembers the same so that he does not repeat the offence again,” the order said.

The 30-year-old convict, Rauf Khan, was booked in a 2010 case for allegedly assaulting a man and hurting him over a road accident brawl.

The court while convicting him in the case noted that during trial, Khan had said he was not offering regular namaz.

In view of this, the court ordered him to offer namaz five times a day for 21 days starting from February 28, plant two trees in the Sonapura Masjid premises and also care for the trees.

Khan was booked under Indian Penal Code Sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 325 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt), 504 (intentional insult to provoke breach of peace) and 506 (criminal intimidation).

The court held Khan guilty under IPC Section 323 and acquitted him of the other charges.