Court No. - 64
Case :- CRIMINAL APPEAL No. - 5423 of 2021 Appellant :- Murari Lal Respondent :- State of U.P. and Another Counsel for Appellant :- Kuldeep Singh Yadav Counsel for Respondent :- A.G.A.,Purushottam Dixit
Hon'ble Saumitra Dayal Singh,J.
1. Supplementary affidavit filed today is taken on record.
2. Heard Sri V.P. Srivastava learned Senior Counsel assisted by Sri Kuldeep Singh Yadav learned counsel for the appellant; Sri Purushottam Dixit learned counsel for the opposite party No.2 and Sri Ashwani Prakash Tripathi , learned AGA for the State and perused the material placed on record.
3. This criminal appeal under Section 14-A(2) of The Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 has been preferred by the appellant with the prayer to set aside the order dated 02.9.2021, passed by learned Special Judge S.C./S.T. (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, Court No.2 Etawah, in Case Crime No. 88 of 2021, under Sections - 147, 148, 149, 323, 504, 506, 307, 302 I.P.C. and Section 3(2)5 S.C./S.T. (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, Police Station - Saifai, District - Etawah, whereby bail application of the appellant has been rejected.
4. At the outset, learned counsel for the appellant submits, against the FIR lodged on 17.5.2021, the appellant is in confinement since 09.8.2021; the appellant claims to have cooperated in the investigation. In any case he is not shown to have unduly evaded arrest; the criminal history of the appellant has been explained; in that regard reference has also been made to the bail order granted by the Division Bench of the Court in Criminal Appeal No. 1399 of 2008 dated 10.7.2009 wherein it has been observed as below:
"The learned counsel for the appellant submitted that there was no intention to kill the victim. The incident took place all of a sudden without premeditation. Learned counsel further submitted that the seat of injuries indicates the possibility of infliction by one shot of fire."
5. It has been further submitted that chargesheet has already been submitted yet, trial has not commenced. Therefore, there is no hope of early conclusion of the trial; on prima facie basis, it has been submitted by learned Senior Counsel that the appellant has been falsely implicated; single gunshot injury was suffered by the deceased; he had died during the course of treatment more than a month after the incident; role of causing that gunshot injury has been assigned to Raghvendra whose case would stand on a different footing; thus it has been submitted that the first informant Vijay Pal had named Rampratap, Nem Singh, Rajeev Kumar and Shivraj as witnesses in the FIR; those persons did not make any statement to support the prosecution allegations for reasons not known to the appellant; the first informant then named the aforesaid four witnesses also as accused persons; thus it has been submitted that the prosecution allegations are plainly false and made up; relying on the statement/dying declaration of the injured, it has been submitted that the role of fire arm injury has been assigned to the co-accused Raghvendra. Also, it has been submitted, the allegations of violation of SC/ST Act are general and made to lend colour to the story.
6. On the other hand learned counsel for the informant has laid stress to the criminal history of the appellant including conviction under Section 302 IPC; referring to statement/dying declaration of the deceased, it has been submitted that the appellant had played active role in the occurrence; further reference has been made to the post mortem report to submit that there are extensive injuries recorded there. Learned A.G.A. has also opposed the prayer for bail of the appellant on similar lines.
7. Having heard learned counsel for the parties and having perused the record, insofar as the criminal history of the appellant is concerned, in face of the observations made in the earlier bail order, it may be too harsh to deprive the appellant of the liberty of bail prayed for solely for reason of that prior conviction; the initial injury report cannot be ignored or overlooked inasmuch as it records only one gunshot injury and role of causing that injury has been assigned to Raghvendra and to no other in the statement of the deceased. All other matters may remain to be examined at the trial. In view of the above, the appellant does appear entitled to bail specially in light of the fact that other co-accused except Raghvendra have already been granted bail, which bail orders have also been placed on record. Accordingly at present, the order passed by the learned court below rejecting the bail application filed by the appellant, cannot be sustained.
7. Without drawing any inference as to facts, in view of the above noted facts & submissions and having regard to the status of the evidence, as has been shown to exist on record, let the appellant be enlarged on bail at this stage.
8. Accordingly, this appeal is allowed and the impugned order dated 02.9.2021, rejecting the bail of the appellant is set aside.
9. Let the accused-appellant, namely, Murari Lal, involved in the aforesaid crime be released on bail on his furnishing personal bonds and two heavy sureties each of the like amount to the satisfaction of Court concerned subject to the condition that appellant shall cooperate in the trial and will not jump the bail.
Order Date :- 23.12.2021 Faraz