Punjab-Haryana High Court
Prince vs State Of Haryana on 30 April, 2025
Author: Sandeep Moudgil
Bench: Sandeep Moudgil
Neutral Citation No:=2025:PHHC:055931
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228
IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA
AT CHANDIGARH
CRM-M-16252-2025
DECIDED ON: 30.04.2025
PRINCE
.....PETITIONER
VERSUS
STATE OF HARYANA
.....RESPONDENT
CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE SANDEEP MOUDGIL
Present: Mr. Rajesh Nain, Advocate
for the petitioner.
Ms. Mayuri Lakhanpal Kalia, DAG Haryana
SANDEEP MOUDGIL, J (ORAL)
1. Prayer
This petition has been filed under Section 483 of BNSS, 2023
(erstwhile Section 439 Cr. P.C). for grant of regular bail to the petitioner in FIR
No. 50 dated 08.02.2022 u/s 302, 201, 34, 120-B IPC and Section 25 of Arms Act,
registered at Police Station Julana, District Jind.
2. Prosecution story set up in the present case as per the version in the
FIR reads as under :-
‘Statement of Chand Ram son of Rattan Singh caste Jaat resident of
Budakhera Lather aged 60 years M. No.9812942064. Stated that I am
permanent resident of above address, I have two sons and one
daughter. Elder son is Rakesh and younger is Rawat. Youngest is my
daughter Poonam. All three are married. Today, on dated 08.02.2022,1 of 7
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I along with my elder son Rakesh were working in our fields at
Karsola Road and my nephew namely Amandeep son of Wazir caste
Jaat resident of Budakhera was also cultivating fields with his tractor.
At about 1:00 noon Amit son of Bijender and Prince son of Devender
residents of village Budakhera and one another boy came to our
fields while riding a motorcycle and started altercating with my son
Rakesh. When my son Rakesh ran towards tractor of my nephew
Amandeep, in the meantime Amit fired at stomach of my son with the
pistol he was armed with. Due to gunshot injury my son Rakesh fell
down and Amit, Prince and one another unknown accomplice, fled
away from the spot on their motorcycle towards village Karsola.
When I and Amardeep reached to Rakesh, he was found dead, due to
gun shot injury. Thereafter Amardeep informed my family members in
the village, who reached on the spot. My nephew Vinod son Sunhera
gave information to the police regarding the incident. On dated
06.02.2022, my son Rakesh had some altercation with Amit and
Prince and Amit and Prince had threatened to kill him. These facts
were disclosed by my son Rakesh to me on the same day. Due to
above mentioned grudge Amit,Prince and another unknown assailant,
whom I can identify, if confronted have murdered my son Rakesh in
pursuant to their common intention. It is therefore, requested to you
that stern legal action may be taken against killers Amit son of
Bijender and Prince son of Devender and another unknown assailant
who killed my son. Statement got recorded. Heard. Which is correct.
SD/ Chand Ram attested by Ranbir Singh SI, PS Jullana, dated
08.02.2022.’
3. Contentions
On behalf of the petitioner
Learned counsel for the petitioner has argued that the petitioner has
been falsely implicated in the present case and no injury has been attributed to the
petitioner. He further submits that the according to the medico legal report, there is
only a single injury, which is inflicted by co-accused namely Amit. The attention
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of this Court has been drawn to an order dated 11.03.2025 (Annexure P-2) passed
by this Court in CRM-M-18217-2024 vide which similarly situated co-accused
namely Shankar has already been enlarged on bail.
On behalf of the State
On the other hand, learned State Counsel appearing on advance
notice, accepts notice on behalf of respondent-State and has filed the custody
certificate of the petitioner, which is taken on record. According to which, the
petitioner is behind bars for 3 years and 1 month and 22 days and is involved in
many other FIRs.
Learned State Counsel on instructions from the Investigating Officer
could not controvert the aforesaid fact but would insist on that gun shot injury has
been caused on the person of the deceased but by co-accused Amit and is in full
consonance with the counsel for the petitioner that no specific role or injury has
been attributed to the present petitioner. Additionally he submits that the petitioner
is a habitual offender, as he is involved in other cases also.
4. Analysis
Be that as it may, considering the facts that admittedly no injury has
been attributed to the petitioner, as is evident from the medico legal report
(Annexure P-3); similarly situated co-accused has already been enlarged on bail
by this Court. Moreover, the petitioner has already suffered incarceration of 3
years 1 month and 22 days, wherein investigation is complete, challan stands
presented to the Court on 10.05.2022, charges have been framed on 26.05.2023
and only 15 PWs have been examined out of total 31 PWs cited by the
prosecution, meaning thereby conclusion of trial shall take considerable time and
as per the principle of the criminal jurisprudence, no one should be considered
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guilty, till the guilt is proved beyond reasonable doubt therefore, detaining the
petitioner behind the bars for an indefinite period would solve no purpose.
Reliance can be placed upon the judgment of the Apex Court rendered
in “Dataram versus State of Uttar Pradesh and another“, 2018(2) R.C.R.
(Criminal) 131, wherein it has been held that the grant of bail is a general rule and
putting persons in jail or in prison or in correction home is an exception. Relevant
paras of the said judgment is reproduced as under:-
“2. A fundamental postulate of criminal jurisprudence is the
presumption of innocence, meaning thereby that a person is believed
to be innocent until found guilty. However, there are instances in our
criminal law where a reverse onus has been placed on an accused
with regard to some specific offences but that is another matter and
does not detract from the fundamental postulate in respect of other
offences. Yet another important facet of our criminal jurisprudence is
that the grant of bail is the general rule and putting a person in jail or
in a prison or in a correction home (whichever expression one may
wish to use) is an exception. Unfortunately, some of these basic
principles appear to have been lost sight of with the result that more
and more persons are being incarcerated and for longer periods. This
does not do any good to our criminal jurisprudence or to our society.
3. There is no doubt that the grant or denial of bail is entirely the
discretion of the judge considering a case but even so, the exercise of
judicial discretion has been circumscribed by a large number of
decisions rendered by this Court and by every High Court in the
country. Yet, occasionally there is a necessity to introspect whether
denying bail to an accused person is the right thing to do on the facts
and in the circumstances of a case.
4. While so introspecting, among the factors that need to be
considered is whether the accused was arrested during investigations
when that person perhaps has the best opportunity to tamper with the
evidence or influence witnesses. If the investigating officer does not
find it necessary to arrest an accused person during investigations, a
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strong case should be made out for placing that person in judicial
custody after a charge sheet is filed. Similarly, it is important to
ascertain whether the accused was participating in the investigations
to the satisfaction of the investigating officer and was not absconding
or not appearing when required by the investigating officer. Surely, if
an accused is not hiding from the investigating officer or is hiding due
to some genuine and expressed fear of being victimised, it would be a
factor that a judge would need to consider in an appropriate case. It
is also necessary for the judge to consider whether the accused is a
first-time offender or has been accused of other offences and if so, the
nature of such offences and his or her general conduct. The poverty
or the deemed indigent status of an accused is also an extremely
important factor and even Parliament has taken notice of it by
incorporating an Explanation to section 436 of the Code of Criminal
Procedure, 1973. An equally soft approach to incarceration has been
taken by Parliament by inserting section 436A in the Code of
Criminal Procedure, 1973.
5. To put it shortly, a humane attitude is required to be adopted by a
judge, while dealing with an application for remanding a suspect or
an accused person to police custody or judicial custody. There are
several reasons for this including maintaining the dignity of an
accused person, howsoever poor that person might be, the
requirements of Article 21 of the Constitution and the fact that there is
enormous overcrowding in prisons, leading to social and other
problems as noticed by this Court in In Re-Inhuman Conditions in
1382 Prisons, 2017(4) RCR (Criminal) 416: 2017(5) Recent Apex
Judgments (R.A.J.) 408 : (2017) 10 SCC 658
6. The historical background of the provision for bail has been
elaborately and lucidly explained in a recent decision delivered in
Nikesh Tara chand Shah v. Union of India, 2017 (13) SCALE 609
going back to the days of the Magna Carta. In that decision, reference
was made to Gurbaksh Singh Sibbia v. State of Punjab, (1980) 2 SCC
565 in which it is observed that it was held way back in Nagendra v.
King-Emperor, AIR 1924 Calcutta 476 that bail is not to be withheld
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as a punishment. Reference was also made to Emperor v. Hutchinson,
AIR 1931 Allahabad 356 wherein it was observed that grant of bail is
the rule and refusal is the exception. The provision for bail is
therefore age-old and the liberal interpretation to the provision for
bail is almost a century old, going back to colonial days.
7. However, we should not be understood to mean that bail should be
granted in every case. The grant or refusal of bail is entirely within
the discretion of the judge hearing the matter and though that
discretion is unfettered, it must be exercised judiciously and in a
humane manner and compassionately. Also, conditions for the grant
of bail ought not to be so strict as to be incapable of compliance,
thereby making the grant of bail illusory.”
Therefore, to elucidate further, this Court is conscious of the basic
and fundamental principle of law that right to speedy trial is a part of reasonable,
fair and just procedure enshrined under Article 21 of the Constitution of India.
This constitutional right cannot be denied to the accused as is the mandate of the
Apex court in “Balwinder Singh versus State of Punjab and Another“, SLP
(Crl.) No.8523/2024. Relevant paras of the said judgment reads as under:-
“7. An accused has a right to a fair trial and while a hurried
trial is frowned upon as it may not give sufficient time to prepare for
the defence, an inordinate delay in conclusion of the trial would
infringe the right of an accused guaranteed under Article 21 of the
Constitution.
8. It is not for nothing the Author Oscar Wilde in “The Ballad of
Reading Gaol”, wrote the following poignant lines while being
incarcerated:
“I know not whether Laws be right,
Or whether Laws be wrong;
All that we know who be in jail
Is that the wall is strong;
And that each day is like a year,
A year whose days are long.”
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As far as the pendency of other cases and involvement of the
petitioner in other cases is concerned, reliance can be placed upon the order of this
Court rendered in CRM-M-25914-2022 titled as “Baljinder Singh alias Rock vs.
State of Punjab” decided on 02.03.2023, wherein, while referring Article 21 of
the Constitution of India, this Court has held that no doubt, at the time of granting
bail, the criminal antecedents of the petitioner are to be looked into but at the same
time it is equally true that the appreciation of evidence during the course of trial
has to be looked into with reference to the evidence in that case alone and not with
respect to the evidence in the other pending cases. In such eventuality, strict
adherence to the rule of denial of bail on account of pendency of other
cases/convictions in all probability would land the petitioner in a situation of
denial of the concession of bail.
5. Relief
In view of the aforesaid discussions made hereinabove, the petitioner
is directed to be released on regular bail on his furnishing bail and surety bonds to
the satisfaction of the trial Court/Duty Magistrate, concerned.
However, it is made clear that anything stated hereinabove shall not
be construed as an expression of opinion on the merits of the case.
The petition in the aforesaid terms stands allowed.
(SANDEEP MOUDGIL)
30.04.2025 JUDGE
Meenu
Whether speaking/reasoned Yes/No
Whether reportable Yes/No
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