Punjab-Haryana High Court
Sunny Alias Sanni vs State Of Haryana on 18 November, 2024
Author: Sandeep Moudgil
Bench: Sandeep Moudgil
Neutral Citation No:=2024:PHHC:149811
CRM-M-55759-2024 -1-
226
IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA
AT CHANDIGARH
CRM-M-55759-2024
DECIDED ON: 18.11.2024
SUNNY ALIAS SANNI .....PETITIONER
VERSUS
STATE OF HARYANA .....RESPONDENT
CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE SANDEEP MOUDGIL
Present: Mr. Rajat Sheokand, Advocate for the petitioner.
Mr. Gagandeep Singh Chhina, AAG, Haryana.
SANDEEP MOUDGIL, J (ORAL)
1. Relief sought
The jurisdiction of this Court has been invoked under Section
483 of BNSS, 2023 for grant of regular bail to the petitioner in FIR No.844,
dated 27.12.2023, under Sections 392, 397 IPC (Sections 120-B, 395, 412
IPC and Section 25(1-B)(a) of Arms Act added later on), registered at Police
Station Chandnibagh, District Panipat.
2. Prosecution story setup in the present case as per the version in
the FIR as under:-
"Copy of application is as under: To, SHO, Police Station
Chandnibagh Panipat. Sir, it is submitted at I, Anmol
Gaba son of Rakesh Kumar Gaba, is resident of House
No.1682, Sector-12, Panipat. I have a plastic granule
manufacturing factory at Sector 25, Shri Ram Marg.
Yesterday on 26.12.2023, I had gone from my factory to
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my house at HUDA, Sector 12, at about 8:00 p.m. In my
absence, 4-5 men of my factory labour were working
under the supervision of my contractor Gulshan son of
Satbir Singh, resident of Village Andawar, Police Station
Danahar, District Mainpuri, U.P. Some labourers were
sleeping. At about 4:00 a.m., I got a call from my factory
contractor Gulshan on my mobile number 9034700069
that tonight between 3:00 a.m. to 3:30 a.m., 3 to 4 boys
entered the factory, showed us their pistol and took 13-14
plastic grain bags. They snatched by putting the bags in
their Baleno car. On receiving this information, I came to
my factory and talked to all the workers who told me the
above fact that 3-4 boys had come to our factory in a
Baleno car and they looted plastic grains from the
factory at pistol point. Now I have come to you. Please
take action against the persons came in the unknown
Baleno car and get our goods. The above mentioned boys
have assaulted my workers." Today at Police Station:-on
receiving written complaint from the contents of the
above complaint offence under Section 392/397 IPC was
found to be made out, upon which FIR No. 844 Dated
27.12.2023 u/s 392/397 IPC, P.S. chandnibagh, Panipat
was registered and computerized copies of the FIR were
prepared. Along with copy of the file along with the
original complaint I SI taking document in possession
leaving for the place of occurrence. The special report of
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the present case are being sent to the Illaka Magistrate
Sahab and senior officers through e-mail. (The FIR was
registered in presence of SI Naresh 04 PS). The
investigating officer in the present case is also SI Naresh
04 panipat."
3. Contentions
On behalf of the petitioner
Learned counsel for the petitioner contends that the petitioner is
on better footing than co-accused Sahil, as he was only alleged to be present
at the spot outside the gate of premises from where the bags have been taken
away using fire arm by other co-accused, who has already been granted the
concession of regular bail by the trial Court vide order dated 22.10.2024. He
further contends that other co-accused namely Mukar Singh and Jarif have
also been granted the concession of regular bail by this Court vide orders
dated 04.09.2024 (Annexure P-2) & 23.09.2024 (Annexure P-3), passed in
CRM-M-42251-2024, CRM-M-43826-2024 respectively.
On behalf of the State
On the other hand, learned State counsel has produced the
custody certificate of the petitioner today in Court, which is taken on record.
He seeks dismissal of the instant petition on the ground that the petitioner is
a habitual offender as he is involved in two more cases.
4. Analysis
Be that as it may, considering the custody period i.e. 10 months
and 04 days for which the petitioner has suffered incarceration; the petitioner
is on better footing than co-accused Sahil, who has already been granted the
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concession of regular bail by the trial Court vide order dated 22.10.2024;
other co-accused namely Mukar Singh and Jarif have also been granted the
concession of regular bail by this Court vide orders dated 04.09.2024
(Annexure P-2) & 23.09.2024 (Annexure P-3), passed in CRM-M-42251-
2024, CRM-M-43826-2024 respectively in addition to the fact that
investigation is complete, challan stands presented to Court on 06.03.2024,
charges have been framed on 07.06.2024 and out of total 15 prosecution
witnesses none has been examined so far, which is suffice for this Court to
infer that the conclusion of trial will take a long time for which the petitioner
cannot be detained behind the bars for an indefinite period.
Reliance can be placed upon the judgment of the Apex Court
rendered in "Dataram versus State of Uttar Pradesh and another", 2018(2)
R.C.R. (Criminal) 131, wherein it has been held that the grant of bail is a
general rule and putting persons in jail or in prison or in correction home is
an exception. Relevant paras of the said judgment is reproduced as under:-
"2. A fundamental postulate of criminal jurisprudence is
the presumption of innocence, meaning thereby that a
person is believed to be innocent until found guilty.
However, there are instances in our criminal law where a
reverse onus has been placed on an accused with regard
to some specific offences but that is another matter and
does not detract from the fundamental postulate in
respect of other offences. Yet another important facet of
our criminal jurisprudence is that the grant of bail is the
general rule and putting a person in jail or in a prison or
in a correction home (whichever expression one may
wish to use) is an exception. Unfortunately, some of these
basic principles appear to have been lost sight of with the
result that more and more persons are being incarcerated
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and for longer periods. This does not do any good to our
criminal jurisprudence or to our society.
3. There is no doubt that the grant or denial of bail is
entirely the discretion of the judge considering a case but
even so, the exercise of judicial discretion has been
circumscribed by a large number of decisions rendered
by this Court and by every High Court in the country. Yet,
occasionally there is a necessity to introspect whether
denying bail to an accused person is the right thing to do
on the facts and in the circumstances of a case.
4. While so introspecting, among the factors that need to
be considered is whether the accused was arrested during
investigations when that person perhaps has the best
opportunity to tamper with the evidence or influence
witnesses. If the investigating officer does not find it
necessary to arrest an accused person during
investigations, a strong case should be made out for
placing that person in judicial custody after a charge
sheet is filed. Similarly, it is important to ascertain
whether the accused was participating in the
investigations to the satisfaction of the investigating
officer and was not absconding or not appearing when
required by the investigating officer. Surely, if an accused
is not hiding from the investigating officer or is hiding
due to some genuine and expressed fear of being
victimised, it would be a factor that a judge would need
to consider in an appropriate case. It is also necessary
for the judge to consider whether the accused is a first-
time offender or has been accused of other offences and if
so, the nature of such offences and his or her general
conduct. The poverty or the deemed indigent status of an
accused is also an extremely important factor and even
Parliament has taken notice of it by incorporating an
Explanation to section 436 of the Code of Criminal
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Procedure, 1973. An equally soft approach to
incarceration has been taken by Parliament by inserting
section 436A in the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.
5. To put it shortly, a humane attitude is required to be
adopted by a judge, while dealing with an application for
remanding a suspect or an accused person to police
custody or judicial custody. There are several reasons for
this including maintaining the dignity of an accused
person, howsoever poor that person might be, the
requirements of Article 21 of the Constitution and the fact
that there is enormous overcrowding in prisons, leading
to social and other problems as noticed by this Court in
In Re-Inhuman Conditions in 1382 Prisons, 2017(4) RCR
(Criminal) 416: 2017(5) Recent Apex Judgments (R.A.J.)
408 : (2017) 10 SCC 658
6. The historical background of the provision for bail has
been elaborately and lucidly explained in a recent
decision delivered in Nikesh Tara chand Shah v. Union of
India, 2017 (13) SCALE 609 going back to the days of
the Magna Carta. In that decision, reference was made to
Gurbaksh Singh Sibbia v. State of Punjab, (1980) 2 SCC
565 in which it is observed that it was held way back in
Nagendra v. King-Emperor, AIR 1924 Calcutta 476 that
bail is not to be withheld as a punishment. Reference was
also made to Emperor v. Hutchinson, AIR 1931
Allahabad 356 wherein it was observed that grant of bail
is the rule and refusal is the exception. The provision for
bail is therefore age-old and the liberal interpretation to
the provision for bail is almost a century old, going back
to colonial days.
7. However, we should not be understood to mean that
bail should be granted in every case. The grant or refusal
of bail is entirely within the discretion of the judge
hearing the matter and though that discretion is
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unfettered, it must be exercised judiciously and in a
humane manner and compassionately. Also, conditions
for the grant of bail ought not to be so strict as to be
incapable of compliance, thereby making the grant of
bail illusory."
Therefore, to elucidate further, this Court is conscious of the
basic and fundamental principle of law that right to speedy trial is a part of
reasonable, fair and just procedure enshrined under Article 21 of the
Constitution of India. This constitutional right cannot be denied to the
accused as is the mandate of the Apex court in "Hussainara Khatoon and
ors (IV) v. Home Secretary, State of Bihar, Patna", (1980) 1 SCC 98.
Besides this, reference can be drawn upon that pre-conviction period of the
under-trials should be as short as possible keeping in view the nature of
accusation and the severity of punishment in case of conviction and the
nature of supporting evidence, reasonable apprehension of tampering with
the witness or apprehension of threat to the complainant.
As far as the pendency of other cases and involvement of the
petitioner in other cases is concerned, reliance can be placed upon the order
of this Court rendered in CRM-M-25914-2022 titled as "Baljinder Singh
alias Rock vs. State of Punjab" decided on 02.03.2023, wherein, while
referring Article 21 of the Constitution of India, this Court has held that no
doubt, at the time of granting bail, the criminal antecedents of the petitioner
are to be looked into but at the same time it is equally true that the
appreciation of evidence during the course of trial has to be looked into with
reference to the evidence in that case alone and not with respect to the
evidence in the other pending cases. In such eventuality, strict adherence to
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the rule of denial of bail on account of pendency of other cases/convictions
in all probability would land the petitioner in a situation of denial of
concession of bail.
5. DECISION:
In view of the discussions made hereinabove, the petitioner is
hereby directed to be released on regular bail on his furnishing bail and
surety bonds to the satisfaction of the trial Court/Duty Magistrate,
concerned.
In the afore-said terms, the present petition is hereby allowed.
However, it is made clear that anything stated hereinabove shall
not be construed as an expression of opinion on the merits of the case.
(SANDEEP MOUDGIL)
18.11.2024 JUDGE
Poonam Negi
Whether speaking/reasoned Yes/No
Whether reportable Yes/No
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