Court No. - 71
Case :- CRIMINAL MISC ANTICIPATORY BAIL APPLICATION U/S 438 CR.P.C. No. - 19475 of 2021 Applicant :- Smt. Navneet Kaur Opposite Party :- State of U.P. Counsel for Applicant :- Amit Kumar Counsel for Opposite Party :- G.A.,Desh Ratan
Hon'ble Deepak Verma,J.
Heard Sri Amit Kumar, learned counsel for the applicant, Sri Desh Ratan, learned counsel for the informant, Sri A. K. Sand, learned AGA-I for the State and perused the material brought on record.
The instant anticipatory bail application has been moved by the applicant-Smt. Navneet Kaur for enlarging her on bail in Case Crime No.865 of 2021, under Sections 420, 406, 467, 468, 471 I.P.C., Police Station Phase-III, District Gautam Budh Nagar.
It is submitted by learned counsel for the applicant that applicant is innocent and respected lady of the society and has been falsely implicated in the present case due to ulterior motive; she is not employee of the company as she had resigned from the company on 08.03.2021; allegation in the FIR is totally false and fabricated; there is no direct evidence against the applicant; there is no previous criminal antecedents against the applicant. It is submitted that the applicant is apprehensive of imminent arrest. In case, the applicant is released on bail, she would not misuse the liberty of bail and would cooperate with the investigation.
Learned counsel for the informant vehemently opposed the bail prayer of the applicant and submits that there is direct allegation against the applicant in embezzling the money of Rs.12 Crore as she had created forged documents to collect the money from customers and executed sale deed. After taking full consideration of flats, the amount deposited in her account and made false entries in the ledger book. The present FIR has been lodged after departmental enquiry. In the department enquiry, it has been found that named accused in the FIR are responsible for embezzling the amount. In support of his contention, he has placed reliance the judgment of Hon'ble Apex Court passed in Criminal Appeal No.1209 of 2021 in the case of Prem Shankar Prasad Vs. The State of Bihar and another. He has place another judgment of Hon'ble Apex Court passed in the case of P. Chidambaram Vs. Directorate of Enforcement in Criminal Appeal No.1340 of 2019 passed on 05.09.2019, in which subsequent para 79 is quoted hereinbelow:-
"79. Observing that economic offences constitute a class apart and need to be visited with different approach in the matter of bail, in Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy v. CBI (2013) 7 SCC 439, the Supreme Court held as under:-
34. Economic offences constitute a class apart and need to be visited with a different approach in the matter of bail. The economic offences having deep-rooted conspiracies and involving huge loss of public funds need to be viewed seriously and considered as grave offences affecting the economy of the country as a whole and thereby posing serious threat to the financial health of the country.
35. While granting bail, the court has to keep in mind the nature of accusations, the nature of evidence in support thereof, the severity of the punishment which conviction will entail, the character of the accused, circumstances which are peculiar to the accused, reasonable possibility of securing the presence of the accused at the trial, reasonable apprehension of the witnesses being tampered with, the larger interests of the public/State and other similar considerations."
Learned AGA submits that applicant is named in the F.I.R. and Investigating Officer during investigation has found that amount involved has extended to Rs.20 Crores and investigation is going on and applicant is directly involved in the present case. Grant of anticipatory bail may affect the investigation, as such, investigation is under process and Investigating Agency is collecting the useful information, hence, the materialize which might have been concealed. The applicant is not entitled for any indulgence by this Court. Hence, the anticipatory bail application of the applicant may be rejected.
The object of Section 438 of the Code of Criminal Procedure is that a person should not be unnecessarily harassed or humiliated in order to satisfy personal vendetta or grudge of complainant or any other person operating the things directly or from behind the curtains.
It is well settled that discretionary power conferred by the legislature on this Court cannot be put in a straitjacket formula but such discretionary power either grant or refusal of anticipatory bail has to be exercised carefully in appropriate cases with circumspection on the basis of the available material after evaluating the facts of the particular case and considering other relevant factors (nature and gravity of accusation, role attributed to accused, conduct of accused, criminal antecedents, possibility of the applicant to flee from justice, apprehension of tempering of the witnesses or threat to the complainant, impact of grant of anticipatory bail in investigation or society etc.) with meticulous precision maintaining balance between the conflicting interest, namely, sanctity of individual liberty and interest of society.
Without expressing any opinion on merits of the case and considering the submissions advanced, the nature and gravity of the accusation, I find no good ground for anticipatory bail to the applicant in the aforesaid case.
Accordingly, the anticipatory bail application of the applicant-Smt. Navneet Kaur, involved in Case Crime No.865 of 2021, under Sections 420, 406, 467, 468, 471 I.P.C., Police Station Phase-III, District Gautam Budh Nagar is hereby rejected.
Order Date :- 17.12.2021 Nitin Verma