Ankit @ Monu vs State Of U.P.
2025 Latest Caselaw 11921 ALL

Allahabad High Court

Ankit @ Monu vs State Of U.P. on 30 October, 2025

Author: Krishan Pahal

Bench: Krishan Pahal

HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
 
 


Neutral Citation No. - 2025:AHC:191081
 

 
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD 
 
CRIMINAL MISC. BAIL APPLICATION No. - 21621 of 2025   
 
   Ankit @ Monu    
 
  .....Applicant(s)   
 
 Versus  
 
   State of U.P.    
 
  .....Opposite Party(s)       
 
   
 
  
 
Counsel for Applicant(s)   
 
:   
 
Krishna Kant Dubey, Raghuvansh Misra, Rakesh Kumar Srivastava, Santosh Kumar Dubey   
 
  
 
Counsel for Opposite Party(s)   
 
:   
 
Ayush Mishra, G.A., Yogendra Misra   
 
     
 
 Court No. - 67
 
   
 
 HON'BLE KRISHAN PAHAL, J.     

1. List has been revised.

2. Short counter affidavit filed by learned counsel for the informant and supplementary affidavit filed by learned counsel for the applicant are taken on record.

3. Heard Shri Raghuvansh Misra, learned counsel for the applicant, Shri Ayush Mishra, learned counsel for the informant as well as Sri Rajendra Prasad Singh, learned State Law Officer and also perused the material placed on record.

4. Applicant seeks bail in Case Crime No. 34 of 2025 under Sections 103(1), 238 B.N.S. and under Section 3/25/27 Arms Act, Police Station Jevar, District Gautam Budha Nagar, during the pendency of trial.

PROSECUTION STORY:

5. The F.I.R. was instituted by the informant stating that his son was missing since 23.01.2025 and the missing report was instituted on 24.01.2025, which was subsequently transformed into an F.I.R. on the application given by the brother of the deceased Sachin.

6. It had come to the knowledge of the informant that dead body was lying in the sewer tank as such the F.I.R. was instituted on 26.01.2025 at 10.22 am.

ARGUMENTS ON BEHALF OF APPLICANT:

7. The inquest proceedings of the deceased person were undertaken on 26.01.2025 itself and it indicates that the information was given at the Police Station at 10.22 am. The brother of the deceased person Sachin, another cousin Anil and uncle Ranveer are the inquest witnesses. At that stage, they have not narrated the story as developed later on.

8. The post mortem report indicates that there are two gunshot injuries of entry and one of exit and a bullet was found embedded in the body of the deceased, which was retrieved by the Doctor conducting the post mortem examination.

9. The size of wound of entry is 1.4 cm x 2.5 cm & 1.3 cm x 0.5 cm respectively and it is mentioned that the said gunshot was fired from .32 bore weapon. The aperture of .32 bore weapon is less than half centimeter.

10. The metallic bullet recovered is of size 1.3 cm x 2.5 cm in diameter, which indicates that the bullet was of size more than 12 bore cartridge, thus it is a clear cut case of false implication and interpolation.

11. Subsequently after the inquest proceedings, the applicant was arrested in the evening at about 2.43 pm and the recovery of a pistol alongwith one live cartridge of .32 bore and a country-made pistol has been falsely planted on the applicant. The said weapon does not match with the bullet recovered from the body of the deceased person.

12. The last seen evidence has been subsequently procured as the statement of one Bharat and Anil, cousin of the deceased person, has been recorded subsequently before whom the applicant is stated to have made an extra-judicial confession in the morning of 26.01.2025. The said extra-judicial confession has no value as the two persons did not carry any clout whatsoever. They were neither the person belonging to administration nor any political leader.

13. The extra-judicial confession does not fall within the category of Section 22 of the Bhartiya Sakshya Adhiniyam.

14. The statement of two other witnesses namely, Omveer and Sanjay Sharma, have been recorded by the Investigating Officer, while the uncle of informant Omveer is stated to have seen the applicant in the Scorpio near the place of recovery of dead body and Sanjay Sharma is stated to have asked the applicant why was he sitting in the said Scorpio, whereby the applicant replied that he was waiting for the deceased to arrive.

15. Further more, three more witnesses of last seen have been subsequently roped in by the prosecution who have seen the applicant and the deceased person before the incident. One of three witnesses is Ranveer, who is the uncle of the deceased person, and was witness no. 2 in the inquest proceedings.

16. Had it been so, the story would have come up on the date of institution of F.I.R. itself, but the said statement has been recorded belatedly on 05.02.2025, which speaks volumes of false implication and a false story has been created as a whole.

17. The statement of the owner/proprietor of the vehicle stand has also been recorded, whereby it is stated that applicant had parked the vehicle i.e. Scorpio in the parking-lot on 24.01.2025. The said evidence also does not come to any help to the prosecution.

18. It is true that bail application of co-accused Jatin has been rejected by the Coordinate Bench of this Court, but there is no parity as far as rejection is concerned and has placed much reliance on the judgment of this Court passed in Nanha S/o Nabhan Kha vs. State of U.P., 1993 Crl.L.J. 938, where it is opined that there is parity of granting the bail and not the rejection.

ARGUMENTS ON BEHALF OF STATE/INFORMANT:

19. It is an open and shut case of brutal murder having been committed and there is last seen evidence of three witnesses, namely, Ranbir, Pradeep and Pappu. In addition to it, there are two other witnesses who had seen the applicant in the said Scorpio, as such the applicant is not entitled for bail.

CONCLUSION:

20. The well-known principle of "Presumption of Innocence Unless Proven Guilty," gives rise to the concept of bail as a rule and imprisonment as an exception.

21. A person's right to life and liberty, guaranteed by Article 21 of the Indian Constitution, cannot be taken away simply because the person is accused of committing an offence until the guilt is established beyond a reasonable doubt. Article 21 of the Indian Constitution states that no one's life or personal liberty may be taken away unless the procedure established by law is followed, and the procedure must be just and reasonable. The said principle has been recapitulated by the Supreme Court in Satender Kumar Antil Vs. Central Bureau of Investigation and Ors., 2022 INSC 690.

22. Reiterating the aforesaid view the Supreme Court in the case of Manish Sisodia Vs. Directorate of Enforcement 2024 INSC 595 has again emphasised that the very well-settled principle of law that bail is not to be withheld as a punishment is not to be forgotten. It is high time that the Courts should recognize the principle that ?bail is a rule and jail is an exception?.

23. Learned A.G.A./State Law Officer could not bring forth any exceptional circumstances which would warrant denial of bail to the applicant.

24. It is settled principle of law that the object of bail is to secure the attendance of the accused at the trial. No material particulars or circumstances suggestive of the applicant fleeing from justice or thwarting the course of justice or creating other troubles in the shape of repeating offences or intimidating witnesses and the like have been shown by learned A.G.A./State Law Officer.

25. Considering the facts and circumstances of the case, submissions made by learned counsel for the parties, the evidence on record, taking into consideration the fact that the information of dead body was well in the knowledge of the informant at the time of institution of FIR coupled with the fact that there are material inconsistencies in the statement of witnesses and one of the three last seen witness Ranveer, who happens to the panch witness no. 2 in the inquest proceedings, and without expressing any opinion on the merits of the case, the Court is of the view that the applicant has made out a case for bail. The bail application is allowed.

26. Let the applicant- Ankit @ Monu, who is involved in aforementioned case crime be released on bail on his furnishing a personal bond and two sureties each in the like amount to the satisfaction of the court concerned subject to following conditions. Further, before issuing the release order, the sureties be verified. (i) The applicant shall not tamper with evidence during trial. (ii) The applicant shall not pressurise/intimidate with the prosecution witnesses. (iii) The applicant shall appear before the trial court on the date fixed.

27. In case of breach of any of the above conditions, it shall be a ground for cancellation of bail.28. It is made clear that observations made in granting bail to the applicant shall not in any way affect the learned trial Judge in forming his independent opinion based on the testimony of the witnesses.

(Krishan Pahal,J.)

October 30, 2025

SY