Now, trial courts can use video-conference to record pleas and examine accused persons, either lodged in prison if they are in judicial custody or in private locations if they are on bail, to ensure the progress of trials in criminal cases during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The High Court of Karnataka upheld the new provision, introduced in the Video Conferencing Hearing Rules, 2020, holding that it was “lawful” in view of two recent judgments of the Supreme Court, which ordered stopping of the presence of undertrial prisoners in courts and use of video-conference to reduce the presence of stakeholders on court premises.

A Division Bench of Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice S. Vishwajith Shetty passed the order while hearing a PIL petition initiated suo motu for addressing the technical and legal difficulties in conducting the proceedings in trial courts owing to the restrictions.

The Supreme Court had said production of all undertrial prisoners before courts must be stopped immediately and video-conference must be used for all purposes in view of the pandemic, and the High Courts could take steps to resort to video-conference.

The order of the court mainly deals with two situations — recording of pleas of accused persons during framing of charges (under Sections 228 and 240 of the Code of Criminal Procedure) and recording of the statements of the accused under Section 313 of the Cr.PC.

If the accused are in prison, prison authorities will have to produce them through video-conference and they will act as coordinators to enable the court to interact with the accused and record their pleas, the Bench said.

If the accused were on bail, the Bench said, trial courts would have to appoint a “fit and proper” person as a coordinator to be present at the location of the accused to facilitate recording of pleas and statements through video-conference. Importantly, trial courts would have to “ascertain whether the accused is clearly audible and whether the accused understands the questions posed to them,” the Bench said.

The Bench also said that if trial courts desired to take the signature of the accused on recorded pleas and statements, the recorded statements had to be sent to the coordinators, who would have to secure the signature after downloading and printing the statements, and send them back to courts.