Consecutive Life Sentences Are Legally Impossible: Supreme Court Reaffirms the Muthuramalingam Rule

In a judgment dated 27 October 2026, a Bench of Justice K. V. Viswanathan and Justice Arun Palli partly allowed the appeal of Raju Shantaram Koli, who stands convicted of the rape and murder of a 12-year-old girl. The Court set aside the direction of the Sessions Court, affirmed by the Bombay High Court, that his two life sentences run consecutively. Applying the Constitution Bench decision in Muthuramalingam v. State Represented by Inspector of Police, (2016) 8 SCC 313, it held that life sentences awarded in a single trial cannot run one after the other, though they stand superimposed on each other. The companion appeal against a High Court order refusing concurrent running in writ jurisdiction was disposed of as infructuous.

Background of the Case

Two appeals were decided by a common judgment authored by Justice Viswanathan. Criminal Appeal No. 5072 of 2026 (arising out of SLP (Crl.) No. 8535 of 2025) challenged the Bombay High Court’s order of 13 January 2025 in Criminal Writ Petition No. 842/2024. Criminal Appeal No. 5073 of 2026 (arising out of SLP (Crl.) No. 20839 of 2026, Diary No. 49371 of 2026) challenged the High Court’s appellate judgment of 10 June 2016, on the limited question of consecutive sentencing.

Delay in the second appeal was condoned “considering the nature of the matter and the fact that the appellant has been in jail throughout,” and leave was granted. Mr. M. Y. Deshmukh appeared for the appellant and Mr. Bharat Bagla for the State of Maharashtra.

Factual Matrix

The following facts were recorded as undisputed:

The appellant was arrested on 30 April 2010 for allegedly raping and murdering a 12-year-old girl on 29 April 2010. He has remained in custody since.

In Sessions Case No. 282/2010, the Additional Sessions Judge, Thane, by judgment dated 27 September 2013, convicted him under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 [corresponding to Section 103 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023] and sentenced him to life imprisonment with a fine of Rs. 5,000. He was also convicted under Section 376 read with Section 342 IPC [corresponding to Sections 64 & 127(2) respectively of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023] and sentenced to life imprisonment with a fine of Rs. 5,000 on both counts. Default of fine carried five months’ simple imprisonment each time. The trial court directed that the substantive sentences run consecutively, “one after other, and not concurrently.”

In Criminal Appeal No. 975/2014, the Bombay High Court on 10 June 2016 confirmed the conviction and sentence. It expressly noted the consecutive direction and said it would not interfere.

Afterwards in 2024, the appellant filed Criminal Writ Petition No. 842/2024 seeking a direction that the life sentences run concurrently. On 13 January 2025 the High Court held that a writ court cannot review a judgment of a coordinate Bench, and left him free to seek relief before the appropriate forum.

Finally, the appellant went to the Supreme Court against both orders. The challenge to the 2016 judgment was confined to the consecutive sentences.

Legal Issues Raised

The principal issue was whether the Trial Court and 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 IPC?

If not, what is the legal effect of two life sentences standing together, particularly on remission and commutation?

The issue that was left open was whether a writ court can direct that sentences run concurrently? The Court held it was “not required to decide” this.

Rationale of the Court

The Court’s reasoning rests wholly on the Constitution Bench in Muthuramalingam, which it reproduced at length and treated as dispositive. The ratio can be stated in four steps.

First, life means the remainder of life. Imprisonment for life is a sentence for the rest of the convict’s natural life, unless commuted or remitted by the competent authority. Second, consecutive life terms are an impossibility. Directing a prisoner to serve life imprisonment “twice over” is anomalous and irrational, because humans have but one life to live. Section 31(1) CrPC [corresponding to Section 25(1) BNSS] must therefore be read to allow consecutive running only where the sentences are not life sentences. Section 427(2) CrPC [corresponding to Section 467(2) BNSS] already carves out the same exception expressly. Third, multiple life sentences are permissible, but must be superimposed. A court may award a life sentence for each qualifying offence, but cannot order them to run consecutively. They are superimposed so that remission or commutation of one does not ipso facto extend to the other. Finally, the judgement holds that “life sentences awarded for multiple offences in a single Trial, cannot be directed to run consecutively.” The consecutive direction was set aside, the remaining operative order was maintained (including the Section 428 CrPC/468 BNSS set-off from 30 April 2010), and directed that the two life sentences be superimposed.

Legal Analysis

The governing rule

Section 31 CrPC allows a court convicting a person of several offences at one trial to order that sentences run consecutively, and Section 427 deals with a person already serving a sentence. Read literally, nothing in Section 31 forbids consecutive life terms, which is why the earlier decisions in Kamalanantha and Ranjit Singh pulled in different directions. Muthuramalingam resolved the conflict by reading the provision in light of what a life sentence is. If it already consumes the whole of a person’s life, a second one cannot begin afterwards.

Application to the facts

The application was straightforward. Both sentences were life sentences imposed in one trial, and the Sessions Court’s direction was a blanket one covering all substantive sentences. The Court struck it down in full and, because the superimposition principle is part of the same holding, even though neither court below had considered it.

Critical evaluation

Once the Constitution Bench rule is accepted, the outcome follows without difficulty. The Court did not need to, and did not, reason independently of Muthuramalingam. That is proper for a two-judge Bench, though it leaves the judgment with little reasoning of its own.

The direction was legally untenable at the time it was made, and the High Court noticed it in 2016 and left it alone. The correction arrived a decade later, only because a convict in custody pursued a delayed special leave petition. The judgment does not comment on why the first appellate review missed the point, and it is a reminder that sentencing directions deserve as much scrutiny as convictions.

The decision does not shorten the appellant’s punishment or touch the conviction. Each life sentence already covers the remainder of his life. What changes is the legal footing: the sentences no longer sit in an impossible sequence, and the remission position is now defined, since relief on one sentence does not automatically release him from the other. The judgment is silent on his eligibility for remission, so it should not be read as a concession on the merits of a rape and murder involving a child.

The judgement speaks of offences tried in a “single Trial,” while Section 427(2) CrPC addresses life sentences for offences “separately tried.” The Constitution Bench’s conclusion is not confined to either. The Court was right not to read the rule narrowly, but a sentence clarifying that the principle applies in both situations would have removed doubt.

The High Court’s refusal to entertain the writ was orthodox, since the sentence is corrected through appeal or revision and not by writ review. The Supreme Court, however, chose not to say so, and prisoners with similar defects in old judgments are left without guidance on the correct route beyond the example of this appeal.

The offences and the trial fall under the IPC and CrPC. The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 appears to carry forward the corresponding sentencing provisions, so the principle should continue to guide courts under the new regime.

Conclusion

The Supreme Court partly allowed Criminal Appeal No. 5073 of 2026, set aside the direction that the life sentences run consecutively, maintained the remainder of the Sessions Court’s operative order, and directed that the two life sentences be superimposed. Criminal Appeal No. 5072 of 2026 was disposed of as infructuous.

The significance of the judgment lies in four points. First, it reaffirms Muthuramalingamand confirms that the rule applies to a common combination, murder with a sexual offence, in which trial courts have been known to stack punishments. Second, it clarifies that the remedy for multiple life terms is superimposition, which preserves the separate operation of remission for each sentence. Third, it shows that a legally unsound sentencing direction can be corrected even after a decade, if the convict remains in custody and the Court is willing to condone delay. Fourth, it leaves open whether a writ court may ever vary the running of sentences, a question that will have to be settled in a future case.

In conclusion, it can be said that a court may impose as many life sentences as the offences warrant, but it may never order them to run one after another. They are served together, and each remains independently open to remission.

Read Full Judgement here : https://api.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2025/21008/21008_2025_11_1501_75525_Judgement_27-Oct-2026.pdf