Khushi Bajpai
Published on: July 20,2022 at 17:12 IST
The Supreme Court made the observation that the term “reasonable grounds” employed in Section 37(1)(b) of the NDPS Act would mean credible, plausible grounds for the court to assume that the accused is not guilty of the alleged act. The Apex Court also said that under Section 37 NDPS Act, bail cannot be granted merely on the grounds that nothing was found from the possession of the accused.
According to a three-judge panel made up of Chief Justice NV Ramana, Justices Krishna Murari and Hima Kohli, neither the length of the respondent’s incarceration nor the fact that a charge sheet has been filed and the trial has begun are sufficient reasons to convince the panel to grant the respondent relief under section 37 of the NDPS Act.
The Court concurred with the High Court’s position that, in light of the ruling in Tofan Singh v. State of Tamil Nadu, the accused’s statements that he had illegally trafficked in drugs during his incarceration must be disregarded. The court did point out that it wasn’t the only piece of evidence the NCB had used to deny the bail request.
ASG Jayant K. Sud, who represented the Narcotic Control Bureau, argued that the current case falls under the category of recovering commercial quantities of narcotic drugs and that the accused should not have been admitted to bail due to the embargo imposed by Section 37 of the NDPS Act and because the accused was an active member of an organized gang that was engaged in smuggling.