Allahabad High Court
Robin Singh vs State Of U.P. And Another on 29 January, 2020
Author: Ramesh Sinha
Bench: Ramesh Sinha
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD ?Court No. - 1 Case :- CRIMINAL MISC ANTICIPATORY BAIL APPLICATION U/S 438 CR.P.C. No. - 1253 of 2020 Applicant :- Robin Singh Opposite Party :- State of U.P. and Another Counsel for Applicant :- Amit Srivastava Counsel for Opposite Party :- G.A. Hon'ble Ramesh Sinha,J.
Heard Sri Amit Srivastava, learned counsel for the applicant, Sri Irshad Hussain, learned A.G.A. for the State and perused the record.
By means of present 438 Cr.P.C. application, the applicant prayed for grant of anticipatory bail in Case Crime No. case crime no. 57 of 2020 under sections 419, 420 I.P.C. and Section 6, 10 of The Uttar Pradesh Public Examination (Prevention of Unfairmeans) Act, 1998, police station Vrindavan, District Mathura.
Learned AGA opposed the prayer for anticipatory bail and pointed out that the applicants have directly approached this Court for seeking anticipatory bail without approaching the Court of Session. On a pointed query made from learned counsel for the applicants he states that he has disclosed the reason for directly approaching this Court in paragraph no.8 of the bail application which is reproduced here below:-
"That the police has raised on several occasions at the house of the applicant, therefore, the applicant has left his house and at present, the applicant is residing outside the territorial jurisdiction of District-Agra and Mathura for saving himself, therefore, the immediate attention of this Hon'ble Court require in the present matter and due to the reason aforesaid, the applicant is filing Anticipatory Bail Application directly before this Hon'ble Court."
I am of the considered opinion that to entertain an anticipatory bail application of the accused directly to this Court, there should be compelling special circumstance or special reason apart of other reasons to show that even the counsel for the accused/applicant has no or limited access to the Court of Session for filing anticipatory bail application or is out of reach meaning thereby that the working of the Court below is paralyzed or the normal life of the city is so disturbed that neither accused nor his counsel could reach the Court of Session for filing anticipatory bail application, any such other similar situation or any other unapproachable or unavoidable situation. Moreover, the object with which the legislature has conferred concurrent power to Court of Session under Section 438 Cr.P.C. along with High Court would not be meaningful if the accused is allowed to approach to this Court directly in routine manner for anticipatory bail.
Even the Full Bench of this Court in the case of Onkar Nath Agrawal and others. Vs. State reported in 1976 (2)ALR 149 and 1976 Crl. L.J.1142 has therefore, left open to the Judge to exercise his discretion for entertaining the anticipatory bail application directly to High Court according to exigencies of each case. The relevant paragraph nos.8 and 12 of the said judgement in this regard are to be taken note of which are reproduced here-in-below:-
"8. It may, however, be mentioned that inasmuch as Section 438 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 gives a discretionary power to grant bail, this discretion is to be exercised according to the facts and circumstances of each case. There may be cases in which it may be considered by the High Court to be proper to entertain an application without the applicant having moved the Court of Session initially. Similarly there may be cases in which the Court may feel justified in asking the applicant to move the Sessions Court or to refer the matter to that Court. In any case all depends upon the discretion of the judge hearing the case.
12. We are, therefore, of the view that the Courts should have an unfettered discretion in the matter of bail under Section 438, Criminal P. C. to be exercised according to the exigencies of each case.
The reason referred above by the applicant for directly approaching this Court with the prayer to grant anticipatory bail is not at all convincing as the same cannot be said to be a special circumstance or special reason or any such situation which may compel this Court to exercise it's discretion to entertain the present application for anticipatory bail directly without availing the remedy before the Court of Session in the present case. More so, the presence of the accused-applicant is not required before the Court of Session for seeking anticipatory bail.
Thus the application is, accordingly, rejected on this ground alone with liberty to approach the Court of Session first for anticipatory bail in the present case.
Order Date :- 29.1.2020 Deepika