Bargained Justice: Legal Psychological Analysis of Plea-Bargaining in India and USA

‘Nolo Contendere’ i.e., ‘do not wish to contend’ forms the basis of the concept of Plea Bargaining wherein the person accused acknowledges that the charges imposed against him are right and he will not contest the same in the court of law. The said concept originated in USA and because of its immense success therein, incorporation of the same in the Indian legal system was persistently recommended by the Law Commission via its 142nd, 154th, and 177th reports. The culmination of the efforts of the Law Commission was the insertion of a new chapter XXIA dealing with the concept of Plea Bargaining by Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2005. This paper briefly traces the origin of the concept of the Plea bargaining and thereby incorporation of the same in the Indian legal system. Thereafter, the paper critically analyses the provisions of Cr.P.C dealing with the concept highlighting that the amendment falls short of the achieving the objective plea bargaining, i.e., to reduce the pendency in criminal cases which results into deferment of justice. Further on, the paper goes on to analyse the role of Indian judiciary in application and implementation of the concept and also throws light on how the Indian Judiciary has implemented the concept of plea bargaining. The present work also does a comparative analysis of with law prevailing in the area in USA and highlights various psychological influences that affect the plea-bargaining process. The paper further analyse the concept with the USA. The paper concludes by giving suggestions for strengthening the system of plea bargaining as it an inevitable component of our adversarial form of criminal justice system.