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The High Court of Punjab and Haryana has annulled an order by the Court of First Instance which revoked the bail and bail of an accused for not appearing in court on a single day.
The Supreme Court, while overturning the lower court’s order, made it clear that the accused’s mere absence from court on a single date was not in itself sufficient to conclude that he was evading arrest and could not be the sole reason for the non-bail orders being issued.
As per details, the petitioner in the case, Major Singh, has been arrested in a drug and narcotics case on 15 July 2018, which was registered at Mehta Police Station, Amritsar. The police claimed to have found about 15 grams of heroin from Major Singh’s possession, which is a non-commercial substance in nature.
According to the petitioner, he was granted regular bail on 27 September 2018 and has been appearing regularly before the Magistrates Court since then. He was charged on August 30, 2019. On October 7, 2022, the petitioner appeared in trial court and prosecution witnesses were called on December 20, 2022. However, on December 20, he was unable to appear In court because he did not feel well. The accused stated that he informed his lawyer about this and asked him to file an exemption request, but somehow it was not submitted. Subsequently, the trial court took notice of the accused’s absence and confiscated bail bonds and bail bonds and issued no-bail orders against him.
The petitioner’s lawyer, Balbir Singh Jaswal, argued that the non-bailable arrest warrants were issued in an automated manner and, therefore, the contested warrants were issued in complete violation of the procedures laid down in the law.
On hearing the order, the Supreme Court bench told Justice Harpreet Singh Brar, “Only on the basis of absence on one date, the trial court, instead of issuing bail orders, directly commenced non-bailable orders. Seeing the contested order indicates that The order has been given even without giving any reasons or proving the petitioner’s satisfaction with his evasion of arrest.This Court is of the opinion that in order to reach a conclusion that the accused is evading arrest, there must be reasonable grounds and that the Court is required to register its satisfaction that the presence The accused cannot be secured by subpoenas or leave to release bail and there are good grounds available on record for assuming that the accused willfully evaded arrest.”
“…the courts cannot issue bail orders in a routine manner without following the exercises laid down in the law. The court is required to record its consent on the basis of the materials available in the record and to at least state the reasons for concluding that the accused willfully evades arrest and cannot be executed The Supreme Court said that bail orders will only be issued after other methods of ensuring the presence of the accused have been exhausted.
“The mere absence of the accused at a single date before the court of first instance is not sufficient in itself to conclude that he is evading arrest nor can it be the only reason for issuing no-bail orders. Courts can certainly take into account the behavior of the accused if it is impeding the course of the trial and is declared in His earlier conduct as an avowed criminal and due to his continued absence from the trial, the trial has been greatly prolonged. Judge Brar asserted that his prior conduct was relevant for the purpose of registering consent under the relevant provisions of the Code.”
Thus, the Supreme Court proceeded to set aside the order given by the Court of First Instance and ordered the petitioner to appear before the Court of First Instance on or before 3 July 2023, and when he does so, he must be admitted by the Court of First Instance on bail upon submission. New bail bonds.
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