Document Fragment View

Matching Fragments

8. any other factors indicating the ties of the accused to the community or bearing on the risk of wilful failure to appear.

If the court is satisfied on a consideration of the relevant factors that the accused has his ties in the community and there is no substantial risk of non-appearance, the accused may, as far as possible, be released on his personal bond. Of course, if facts are brought to the notice of the court which go to show that having regard to the condition and background of the accused his previous record and the nature and circumstances of the offence, there may be a substantial risk of his non-appearance at the trial, as for example, where the accused is a notorious bad character or a confirmed criminal or the offence is serious (these examples are only by way of illustration), the court may not release the accused on his personal bond and may insist on bail with sureties. But in the majority of cases, considerations like family ties and relationship, roots in the community, employment status etc. may prevail with the court in releasing the accused on his personal bond and particularly in cases where the offence is not grave and the accused is poor or belongs to a weaker section of the community, release on personal bond could, as far as possible, be preferred. But even while releasing the accused on personal bond it is necessary to caution the court that the amount of the bond which it fixes should not be based merely on the nature of the charge. The decision as regards the amount of the bond should be an individualised decision depending on the individual financial circumstances of the accused and the probability of his absconding. The amount of the bond should be determined having regard to these relevant factors and should not be fixed mechanically according to a schedule keyed to the nature of the charge. Otherwise, it would be difficult for the accused to secure his release even by executing a personal bond. Moreover, when the accused is released on his personal bond, it would be very harsh and oppressive if he is required to satisfy the court-and what we have said here in regard to the court must apply equally in relation to the police while granting bail-that he is solvent enough to pay the amount of the bond if he fails to appear at the trial and in consequence the bond is forfeited. The inquiry into the solvency of the accused can become a source of great harassment to him and often result in denial of bail and deprivation of liberty and should not, therefore, be insisted upon as a condition of acceptance of the personal bond. We have no doubt that if the system of bail, even under the existing law, is administered in the manner we have indicated in this judgment, it would go a long way towards relieving hardship of the poor and help them to secure pretrial release from incarceration. It is for this reason we have directed the undertrial prisoners whose names are given in the two issues of the Indian Express should be released forthwith on their personal bond. We should have ordinarily said that personal bond to be executed by them should be with monetary obligation, but we directed as an exceptional measure that there need be no monetary obligation in the personal bond because we found that all these persons have been in-jail without trial for several years, and in some cases for offences for which the punishment would in all probability be less than the period of their detention and moreover, the order we were making was merely an interim order. The peculiar facts and circumstances of the case dictated such an unusual course.