Tanisha Rana
Published on: October 28, 2022 at 20:50 IST
The Supreme Court recently objected to how an Allahabad High Court judge dismissed around 45 petitions for anticipatory bail in the same manner for non-prosecution on a single day.
“We are not supposed to comment at this stage but direct the Registrar of the High Court of Allahabad to submit the report to this Court after obtaining from the concerned Judge (Krishan Pahal,J.) as to what prevailed upon him in passing the orders..”
“…consistently almost in 45 matters at a given point of time on the same date dismissing them in the same fashion for non-prosecution, that too when one has approached the Court for protecting his liberty which is sacrosanct under Article 21 of the Constitution.”
In this regard, Justices Ajay Rastogi and CT Ravikumar of the Division Bench have requested a report from the High Court Registrar in order to inquire of the concerned High Court Judge as to why he has been acting in such an odd manner.
The High Court’s decision to deny the petitioner’s request for anticipatory bail for non-prosecution on September 29, 2022, was being challenged in a Special Leave Petition that the Bench was examining at the time.
The petitioner’s counsel had told the court about the string of “stereo typed orders” the High Court Judge had issued on September 29, 2022, rejecting the petitioner’s request for non-prosecution.
The petitioner’s counsel had told the court of the string of “stereo typed orders” issued by the High Court Judge dismissing the pre-arrest bail applications in a similar manner.
“This kind of approach in passing orders is not acceptable by this Court at any cost”, the Bench remarked while deprecating the High Court Judge’s behaviour.
The Bench then went on to issue notice on the case. Before releasing the order, the Court additionally suspended the petitioner’s detention in light of the temporary injunction issued by the High Court on July 2.
The petitioner was the subject of a FIR for offences listed in Sections 420, 406, 504, 506, 307, and 323 of the Indian Penal Code, all of which are punishable by fine or imprisonment.
On November 25, the matter will be heard again.