India, Feb. 7 -- The Supreme Court said that persons on a fixed term sentence should be released on bail and their sentence suspended if their appeal is unlikely to be decided before completion of their sentence.

SC was dealing with a case from Madhya Pradesh, where a person facing sentence of five years was denied bail by the Madhya Pradesh high court.

In the order, a top court bench headed by justice AS Oka said, "Notwithstanding several decisions of this Court holding that when there is a fixed term sentence and especially when the appeal is not likely to be heard before completing entire period of sentence, normally suspension of sentence and bail should be granted."

The Court directed accused Atul alias Ashutosh to be produced bef...