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Synopsis

The Supreme Court has said liberty of a citizen under Article 21 of the Constitution is of the paramount importance and the courts should not shut out plea for bail on one reason or another.

A bench of Justices B R Gavai and Sandeep Mehta expressed its concern over the regular bail and anticipatory bail applications are not being decided promptly by the Bombay High Court.

The court asked the Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court to convey the top court's request to all the judges to decide bail or anticipatory bail applications as expeditiously as possible.

"Needless to state that Article 21 of the Constitution of India is the soul of the Constitution as the liberty of a citizen is of paramount importance. Not deciding the matter pertaining to liberty of a citizen expeditiously and shunting away the matter on one or the other ground would deprive the party of their precious right guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution of India," the bench said.

Dealing with a matter, the bench said it has come across various matters from the Bombay High Court, where the bail/anticipatory bail applications are not being decided expeditiously. 

"We have also come across one matter SLP Crl….@ Diary No.1540/2024 (Ashok Balwant Patil v Mohan Madhukar Patil and Ors), wherein the application for anticipatory bail was not decided for a period of more than four years," the bench said.

"We have also come across numerous matters wherein the Judges are not deciding the matter on merits but find an excuse to shunt the case on different grounds," the bench added.

The court therefore asked the Chief Justice of the High Court of Bombay to convey request to all the Judges exercising the criminal jurisdiction to decide the matter pertaining to bail/anticipatory bail as expeditiously as possible.

The bench also asked the Registrar (Judicial) concerned of this court is directed to communicate this order to the Registrar (Judicial) of the High Court who should place it before the Chief Justice of the High Court.

In the case at hand, the bench noted the High Court granted bail to the petitioner on merits on February 12, 2024 after an order was passed by the court on January 29, 2024.

The court had earlier noted the Bombay High Court instead of deciding the bail application by the petitioner just granted him liberty to approach the trial court even after noting that he has been in jail for about 7.5 years.

The bench had then said the approach of the High Court in only permitting him to file an application for bail before the trial court/sessions court and not deciding his prayer for bail on merits would amount to non-exercise of jurisdiction vested in it.

"The petitioner had been languishing in prison for seven and a half years at the time on which the order was passed by the Single Judge and by now he has suffered custody of more than eight years, the High Court rather than asking the petitioner to take another round of litigation ought to have decided the matter on merits," the bench had said in its order on January 29, 2024.