Brief Facts
- The appeal was filed by the Original Complainant, uncle of the minor prosecutrix, challenging the bail granted to the accused who was alleged of gang-raping a minor girl in a hotel and had also prepared the video of the incident. Thereafter, the accused raped the prosecutrix on several occasions by threating her to release the video. He also forced the minor girl to hand over the gold ornaments of her mother to him and was extracting money from her. The FIR was lodged with the delay of 13 months. The video of the incident was not recovered during the course of investigation.
- The High Court allowed the bail application of the accused persons considering the delay in lodging the FIR and non-recovery of the Video. The Complainant approached the Apex Court for bail cancellation.
Issues
- Whether the High Court was correct in allowing the bail application of the accused solely on the ground of delay in FIR and non-recovery of video of incident, though the accused persons were alleged for heinous offences and were in the position to influence the trial?
- Relevant parameters for considering the bail application of the accused.
Held
- The Apex Court allowed the appeal and cancelled the bails granted to the accused persons and they were granted the liberty to move the bail application before the High Court after recording of the evidences of the remaining witnesses.
- The grant of bail is a discretionary relief which necessarily means that such discretion would have to be exercised in a judicious manner and not as a matter of course. The grant of bail is dependant upon contextual facts of the matter being dealt with by the Court and may vary from case to case. There cannot be any exhaustive parameters set out for considering the application for grant of bail. However, it can be noted that;
- While granting bail the court has to keep in mind factors such as the nature of accusations, severity of the punishment, if the accusations entails a conviction and the nature of evidence in support of the accusations;
- reasonable apprehensions of the witnesses being tempered with or the apprehension of there being a threat for the complainant should also weight with the Court in the matter of grant of bail.
- While it is not accepted to have the entire evidence establishing the guilt of the accused beyond reasonable doubt but there ought to be always a prima facie satisfaction of the Court in support of the charge.
- Frivility of prosecution should always be considered and it is only the element of genuineness that shall have to be considered in the matter of grant of bail and in the event of there being some doubt as to the genuineness of the prosecution, in the normal course of events, the accused is entitled to have an order of bail.
- The fact that Deepak is the son of sitting MLA would disclose the domineering influence he would wield not only in delaying the proceedings but also in pressurizing the witnesses to either resile from their statement given during the course of investigation or pose threat to them from deposing against accused on their failure to act according to his dictates or induce them to testify as per his dictates or to help the defence of the accused.
- In the aforesaid circumstances, we notice that the impugned order granting bail is not only bereft of material particulars which would justify grant of bail, but it seems that the High Court has got swayed on the ground of delay and the video having not been recovered during the course of investigation and has given a complete go by to the allegation made in the FIR and statement recorded under Section 161 and 164 of the Cr.P.C. as also the testimony of the prosecutrix before the jurisdictional court.
Relevant Para No.
- 12,23, 27