Double Jeopardy

In one line

A person may not be prosecuted twice for the same offence, and by statute may not even be tried twice on the same facts for a different offence.

In the wording a student can write in an exam: article 20(2) of the Constitution provides that no person shall be prosecuted and punished for the same offence more than once, and section 337 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita provides that a person once tried by a court of competent jurisdiction for an offence and convicted or acquitted of it shall not, while that conviction or acquittal remains in force, be liable to be tried again for the same offence, nor on the same facts for any other offence for which a different charge might have been made or of which he might have been convicted; so the statutory bar is wider than the constitutional one in three distinct ways.

The two provisions

Article 20(2). No person shall be prosecuted and punished for the same offence more than once.

Section 337. A person who has once been tried by a court of competent jurisdiction for an offence and convicted or acquitted of it shall not, while such conviction or acquittal remains in force, be liable to be tried again for the same offence, nor on the same facts for any other offence for which a different charge might have been made against him, or of which he might have been convicted.

The three differences

Kolla Veera Raghav Rao v. Gorantla Venkateswara Rao, (2011) 2 SCC 703, states the comparison in terms.

Facts. The appellant had already been convicted under section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act and was afterwards prosecuted on the same facts for cheating under the Penal Code. He contended he could not be tried again on the same facts.

Held. There is a difference between the language of article 20(2) and the statutory provision. Article 20(2) says only that no person shall be prosecuted and punished for the same offence more than once. The statutory provision says that a person once tried and convicted or acquitted shall not be liable to be tried again for the same offence, nor on the same facts for any other offence for which a different charge might have been made or of which he might have been convicted. The statutory provision is therefore wider than article 20(2). In the case before the Court the offences were different but the facts were the same, so the statutory bar applied and the later prosecution could not stand.

Why it matters here. It is the case MU's short note is asking for, because it puts the difference in the two texts side by side.