Lingkesvaran Rajendaren v Public Prosecutor

Lingkesvaran Rajendaren was a prisoner awaiting capital punishment who was scheduled to be executed on 11 February 2026. He had been convicted after trial of trafficking in 52.77g of diamorphine under s 5(1)(a) of the Misuse of Drugs Act and given the mandatory death penalty, and his appeal in CA/CCA 39/2018 was dismissed on 27 March 2019.

After receiving his notice of execution on 4 February 2026, he filed HC/OC 136/2026, a claim about his treatment in prison, and CA/OAC 1/2026, which sought permission to apply for a stay of execution pending that claim. OAC 1 was dismissed on 10 February 2026, with OC 136 found to be an abuse of process aimed only at delay. That evening he sent papers through the Singapore Prison Service, filed the next morning as CA/OAC 2/2026.

In it he said he was illiterate and that, at trial, statements of Central Narcotics Bureau officers and other documents were not read or translated to him except for the parts used in cross-examination, in breach of Arts 9 and 12 of the Constitution. He claimed the statements held discrepancies that a fellow inmate later pointed out to him, and that had he known of them he could have shown a break in the chain of custody of the bag he was said to have handed to his co-accused. Although framed under s 60G of the Supreme Court of Judicature Act 1969, a single judge sitting in the Court of Appeal treated it as an application under s 394H of the Criminal Procedure Code for permission to make a review application.

1. Whether the application should be treated as one for permission to make a review application under s 394H of the Criminal Procedure Code
2. Whether the applicant's material on untranslated statements and a break in the chain of custody was sufficient and compelling under s 394J
3. Whether the intended review application had a reasonable prospect of success or was an abuse of process

Although the papers invoked the post-appeal procedure for capital cases, the applicant was in substance attacking the validity of his conviction and sentence. That is the territory of a review application, which needs the appellate court's permission first, so the court treated the filing as a permission application under s 394H.

Permission requires a legitimate basis for review: sufficient material showing a miscarriage of justice. The material must not have been canvassed before, must not have been obtainable earlier with reasonable diligence, and must be compelling. The court found the applicant's assertions unreliable because they contradicted his own case at trial. His defence at trial and on appeal was never that he did not give the bag, Bundle P3, to his co-accused; it was that he thought the bundle held tobacco. The trial judge recorded that his delivery of Bundle P3 was undisputed, and on appeal his counsel accepted that the only question was his knowledge of the drugs. It was not credible that he, present at trial with counsel, failed to notice then that the bag was a different one.

The applicant did not say when he learned of the alleged discrepancies, and the length and detail of his submissions suggested it was some time ago, with no satisfactory reason for raising them only on the eve of execution. He had counsel at trial, new counsel on appeal and counsel in later matters, so any discovery could have been made earlier. With no reasonable prospect of success, the court dealt with the application summarily.

The court dismissed the application summarily under s 394H(7) of the Criminal Procedure Code without setting it down for hearing. It found the material unreliable, not compelling and showing no miscarriage of justice, so the intended review had no reasonable prospect of success, and it described the filing as an eleventh-hour step taken solely to delay execution and an abuse of process.