No court in the country can grant anticipatory bail to a proclaimed offender evading arrest, a Supreme Court judgement held on Friday.
The order, that could put high-profile accused in a bind, was passed by a bench headed by Chief Justice P Sathasivam. It said: “If anyone is declared an absconder or proclaimed offender in terms of Section 82 of the Criminal Procedure Code, he is not entitled to the relief of anticipatory bail.” While anticipatory bail was denied to accused on the run on several occasions in the past, the court found gaps in the implementation of this rule.
A case brought to the court showed how a man accused of a serious offence like murder, remained underground for two years. Not just this, the accused, identified as Pradeep Sharma, even stood for Sarpanch elections in Chhindwara in Madhya Pradesh. He was accused of poisoning his rival candidate.
Within two months of the incident that took place on September 11, 2011, the police issued warrants for his arrest, but failed to nab him. The police then declared him a proclaimed offender along with another co-accused. While on the run, Sharma approached High Court on August 2012, but got no relief on the ground that his custodial interrogation was necessary. Surprisingly, the same High Court gave the much-needed relief to the accused in January 2013, reversing its previous decision, which was clandestinely kept under wraps by the accused. The other accused too got similar relief.
Setting aside the order, the apex court faulted the HC on many accounts. This was a case involving offences punishable under Sections 302 (murder) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) read with Section 34 (common intention) of IPC. “In such serious offences, particularly with the respondents being proclaimed offenders, we are unable to sustain the impugned orders of granting anticipatory bail,” the court said.
“Where the accused has been declared an absconder and has not cooperated with the investigation, he should not be granted anticipatory bail,” the judgement said, while pointing out that this settled position of law was ignored by the High Court. As a consequence of its order, both accused were directed by the apex court to surrender before the concerned court in two weeks.