The Orissa High Court on Friday granted conditional bail to gangster Sandip alias Raja Acharya in connection with a seven-year-old abduction and extortion case registered against him by the Commissionerate police.
A murder convict serving life sentence, Raja, who has also about 40 other criminal cases pending against him, is likely to walk free on bail as he has so far been granted bail in all the pending cases against him, including in a 10-year-old murder case.
In March last year, the Supreme Court had granted him bail in the 2008 murder case. A lower court in Bhubaneswar had convicted and sentenced him life imprisonment for murdering Bhubaneswar-based judo coach Biranchi Das.
Ever since he was arrested from Goa in May 2008, Raja had been in jail even as he managed to obtain bail in the murder case from the Supreme Court. He was not allowed to walk free for he was denied bail in the 2010 abduction case.
Justice JP Dash on Friday allowed his application asking him to go on bail after producing in the court a property guarantee of Rs 50,000 and with two bail bonds of the like amount. He was asked to cooperate with the IO as and when required.