Gobarbhai Naranbhai Singala v. State of Gujarat & Ors.
BHAN, J. 1. Leave granted.
2. This judgment shall dispose of the Criminal Appeal
arising out of SLP(Crl) No. 4283/2006 (for short "1st case") and
Criminal Appeal arising out of SLP(Crl) No. 6646/2005 (for short
"2nd case").
3. The 1st case has been filed by the Complainant
Jayeshbhai @Panchabhai M. Satodiya seeking cancellation of
the bail granted to respondent Shri Jayrajsinh Temubha Jadeja
who, at that time, was a sitting Member of Legislative Assembly
of Gujarat (the first accused in Criminal Case No.1-25/2004 0 registered under Sections 302, 307, 143, 147, 148, 149, 341,
1208, 201 IPC and Sections 25(1)A, (1-a), 27 of the Arms Act
and Section 135 of the Bombay Police Act at Police Station
Gondal City) for the alleged murder of Nilesh.
4. The 2nd case has been filed by the complainant, namely, E
Gobarbhai Naranbhai Singala seeking cancellation of the bail
granted to the respondents - Shri Shivbhadrasinh @ Gopalsinh
Giriraj Jadeja (Respondent No.2 herein) and Shri Jayrajsinh
Themubha Jadeja (Respondent No.3 herein) [2nd and 3rd
Accused in Criminal Case No.1-173/2005, wrongly mentioned F
as 1-102/2004 dated 19.3.2004] registered at Police Station
Malviya Nagar, Rajkot City, Rajkot under sections 143, 148, 149,
449, 302 IPC and 25(1 )(b)(a) of the Arms Act, for the alleged
murder of appellant's son Vinodrai Singala.
5. The facts in brief culminating into filing of these appeals G
are narrated below.
6. That, on 9th February, 2004 the complainant Jayeshbhai
[appellant in 1st case] along with Nilesh Rayani and Ramjibhai
Markana had allegedly gone to hostel. While coming back, they H
A were followed by a car, which overtook Jayeshbhai's vehicle
/'.
driven by Ramjibhai. When they reached near Central Talkies •
at about 8.15 p.m., three persons, namely Jairajsinh Jadeja, ~
Amarjit Singh and Bhagat came out of the car and allegedly
fired at the Jayeshbhai's car. The said fire hit the glass of the
B car. Jayeshbhai was hit by the shattered pieces of glass.
Ramjibhai, who was driving the car at that point of time, to save ~-
himself, came out of the vehicle and tried to run away. But finding
that there was another car which was following them, he again '(
entered the vehicle. Meanwhile, the deceased Nilesh started
c driving the vehicle. The respondent-Jayrajsinh Jadeja again fired
which hit Nilesh Rayani. The car went out of control and hit ,,
another car and thereafter side railing on the road. The appellant I
'
and Ramjibhai ran away from the scene and, while running, they ~
saw that the Nilesh Rayani was being beaten by other persons.
D Nilesh died on the spot. The appellant came to his house where
Vinubhai Singala and others were present. Appellant thereafter
narrated the story to Vinubhai Singala and then they went to
meet Ramjibhai, who was hiding in the Town hall out of fear.
They lodged the report, i.e., Case No.1-25/2004 under Sections
302, 143, 147, 148, 149, 341, 307, 120B, 201 IPC, Sections
25(1 )(a) and 27 of the Arms Act and Section 135 of the Bombay
Police Act.
7. On 17th February, 2004 the respondent was released
on anticipatory bail by the Additional Sessions Judge, Rajkot in
F Criminal Misc. Application No. 28/2004. The State of Gujarat '•
filed CPA No.102/2004 in the High Court, seeking cancellation ¥
of the anticipatory bail granted to the respondent. Appellant also
~
filed CRA No.92/2004 for the same relief. Anticipatory bail
granted to the respondent was cancelled by the High Court on
G 5th March, 2004.
8. On 19th March, 2004 Vinubhai Singala (Vinod Rai I
Singala) was murdered. The respondent was named in the FIR
...L.
t> as one of the assailants. The case was registered as Criminal
Case No. 1-173/05 at P.S. Malviya Nagar, Rajkot. The said FIR t:_
H was lodged by Gobarbhai Naran?hai Singala, father of the
GOBARBHAI NARANBHAI SINGALA v. STATE OF 137
GUJARAT & ORS. [BHAN, J.]
deceased Vinubhai Singala, appellant in the 1st Appeal under A
Sections 143, 148, 149, 447, 302 IPC and 23(1)(b) of Arms
. Act. In the said FIR it was inter alia alleged:
"Today at about 8/00 to 8/30 a.m. my son Vinodrai was
reading newspaper in garden of bungalow compound and 8 was seating in the coat, nearby Vanupuriyabhai was
seating. And after giving grass to my cow myself came in
garden and heard a sound of firing and when I seen that
were two persons who were fining out of which one
Viranndev and other Gopalsinh after firing both of them
ran away to the east side of building wall which I have C
seen I know them they are residing in Gondal. I do not
know full name of the person, they were jumped the wall
at that time on wall M.L.A. Jayrajsinh Jadeja was standing
and the person who runaway has told him that they have
completed Vinodrai Singala and revenge has been taken D
and telling this they got down the wall and runaway with
them."(sic)
9. Pursuant to the cancellation of bail by the High Court in
Criminal Case No.1-25/2004, the respondent surrendered on
20th of March, 2004. After his arrest, the respondent filed an E
application for bail in Criminal Case No.1-25/2004.
10. The High Court by its order dated 14th September,
2004 refused to grant bail to the respondent, inter alia,
observing: F
"From the aforesaid facts and looking to the statements of
the witnesses, panchnama, reports, including ballistic
report, prima facie reflects that there is direct involvement
of the applicants in commissioning of the offences. The
applicants were not available after the offence is G
committed as narrated in para 6 and para 8 of the judgment
by the trial court. Looking to gravamen of charge against
the present applicants, their involvement (prima facie
clearer from the record of the case), quantum of
punishment, their tenancy (sic) to remain away from police H
+--
)',
A (as per para 6 and para 8 of judgment of the trial court),
leads me to believe that they may not be available at the
time of trial and due to cumulative effect of all the aforesaid
factors, I am not inclined to use discretionary power, to
enlarge the present applicants on bail, there, is no
B substance in the present application and hence, the
present application is rejected. Notice is discharged."
11. Aggrieved against the rejection of bail by the High Court
in Crl. Misc. Application No. 7579/2004, the respondent filed a
petition being SLP (Crl) No.1128/2005 before this Court.
12. This Court while rejecting the petition on 18th February,
f 2005, observed as under:
"Delay condoned.
D It is stated that the petitioner has been in custody since r-
28th March 2004 and in the case of the co-accused whose
bail application was rejected, this Court made an
observation on 1.11.2004, that the bail application could ..,.,
be renewed after six months. i r
E Though we are not inclined to interfere at this stage, we
would like to give liberty to the petitioner to renew bail
application before the High Court after four months. Such
bail application, if filed, shall be considered on its own
merits."(sic) ~
F 13. Respondents filed M.A. No.8305/2004 seeking bail. }(
On 25th October, 2005 the High Court granted bail to the
respondents herein in CR No.1-173/2005, lodged by the appellant
in the 2nd case - Gobarbhai.
G 14. Against the aforesaid order, the complainant Gobarbhai
has filed the Appeal arising out of SLP(Crl) No. 6646/2005, -..L
seeking cancellation of the bail granted to the respondents, in
which this Court issued notice on 16th of December, 2005.
15. In· Criminal Case No.1-25/2004 (incident of 9th February
H 2004) respondent filed an application for temporary bail, which
GOBARBHAI NARANBHAI SINGALA v. STATE OF 139
GUJARAT & ORS. [BHAN, J.]
was granted by the High Court on 23rd of December, 2005 for A
one month. Respondent was released on bail on 27th December,
2005. Appellant filed an application for cancellation of temporary
bail granted to the respondent. In the meantime, on expiry of the
period of temporary bail granted to the respondent, the
respondent had surrendered on 27.1.2005. Thus, application B
filed by the appellant, seeking cancellation of the temporary bail
was dismissed as infructuous on 1 oth February, 2005, as the
respondent had already surrendered.
15. On 3rd of March, 2005, the respondent filed another
application for temporary bail in Criminal Case No. 1-25/2004, C
which was granted by the High Court for a period of one month
from 5th March, 2005 to 5th of April, 2006. After expiry of the
period of temporary bail, the respondent surrendered and
thereafter filed a Criminal Misc. Application, which came up for
hearing before the same Hon'ble Judge who had heard Crl.Misc. D
Application No. 7579/2004 filed earlier by the respondent in
which prayer for grant of bail was turned down by his order dated
14th September, 2004. This time, the Hon'ble Judge granted
regular bail to the respondent by observing thus:
"5. Having heard the learned advocates for the rival sides E
and looking to th~ facts and circumstances of the case, it
appears that the applicant is in judicial custody since
March, 2004. Sessions case has not yet commenced and
no prosecution witness has been examined. Moreover,
this Court has twice granted temporary bail to the present F
applicant, initially for the period from 27th December, 2005
to 27th January, 2005 with stringent conditions and the
present applicant had surrendered to the judicial custody
in time without any breach of conditions. Similarly, for the
second time also, this Court had granted temporary bail G
to the present applicant for the period from 5th March,
2006 to 5th March,. 2006 (sic) with stringent conditions
and at that time also, the applicant had surrendered to
judicial custody in time without any breach of conditions.
The offence being Cr. No.1.102 of 2004 was registered in H
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140 SUPREME COURT REPORTS [2008) 2 S.C.R.
A the intervening period wherein charge sheet has already
been filed which is not against the present applicant. Thus,
twice this court has tested the present applicant for one
month. On each of the occasions, the conditions imposed
by this Court have been fulfilled and obeyed by the
8 applicant coupled with the fact that no prosecution witness
has yet been examined though period of more than two .·
years have elapsed.
6. In view of the above facts and circumstances of the
case, this application is required to be allowed and the
applicant is required to be enlarged on bail. Accordingly,
the applicant is hereby ordered to be enlarged on bail in
pursuance of the offence registered bearing C.R. No.125/
2004 at Gonda! Police Station on his furnishing a bond of
Rs.50,000/- (Rs. Fifty Thousand) and solvent surety of the
D like amount, on the following terms and conditions that he
shall: \.
~- • (a) not take undue advantage of his liberty or abuse his
liberty;
E (b) not act in a manner injurious to the interest of the
prosecution;
© maintain law and order;
(d) mark his presence on every Tuesday and Friday in a
·F week at Sector 21, Police Station, Gandhinagar between )(
9.00 a.m. to 2.00 p.m.;
(e) not leave the State of Gujarat without prior permission
of the Sessions Court concerned;
G (f) furnish the address of his residence at the time of
-}...
execution of the bond and shall not change the residence
without prior permission of this Court;
(g) not.enter into the local limits of district Rajkot without
prior permission of this Court, but for attending the Court
H in connection with this case he will be free to enter the
GOBARBHAI NARANBHAI SINGALA v. STATE OF 141
GUJARAT & ORS. [BHAN, J.]
A limits for a period to the extent necessary and will leave A
the limits thereafter soon after the case is adjourned;
(h) surrender his passport, if any, to the lower court within
a week."
17. Aggrieved against the aforesaid order granting bail to B
the respondent in Crl. Case No. 1-25/2004, Jayeshbhai has filed
the Appeal arising out of SLP(Crl) No. 4283/2006, seeking
cancellation of bail.
18. Heard learned counsel appearing for the parties.
19. The High Court by the impugned order has granted
bail to the respondent-Jayrajsinh Jadeja (in 2nd case) on three
grounds - (i) that the respondent was in judicial custody since
March, 2004; (ii) that trial had yet not commenced and no
prosecution witness had been examined; and (iii) that the Court D had tested the respondent twice by granting temporary bail to
him with stringent conditions for a duration of one month each,
i.e., from 27th December 2004 to 27th January, 2005 and 6th
~ March, 2006 to 5th April, 2006 and, on both the occasions, the
respondent had surrendered within time, without breach of any E of the conditions.
20. From a reading of the impugned order it is found that
the learned Judge, who incidentally happens to be the same
Judge who had declined to release the respondent on bail
earlier, did not advert to any of the reasons given by him declining F
~
to release the respondent on bail. There was no change of
(
circumstances. The reasons given by the learned Judge in the =-4
impugned order for grant of bail ~re untenable.
21. That the respondent did not misuse his liberty while on
temporary bail twice by itself is no ground to grant bail in a murder G
case especially when he was allegedly involved in a subsequent
"\ --i case of murder. It may be mentioned here that apart from the
present two cases of murder, respondent has been named in
"""'
10 other criminal cases in the last 25 years or so, out of which 5
' cases were under Section 307 IPC for attempt to murder and H
A another under Section 302 IPC for committing murder. We are I'.
informed ;:it the Bar that the respondent has.been acquitted in
most of the cases for want of sufficient evidence. This speaks
volumes. We refrain from saying anything further, lest it may
prejudice the trial in these two cases.
B 22. The other reason given in the impugned order is that
the trial of the case has not progressed I begun. We find from
the record that between 2nd June, 2004 and 19th December,
2005 the case was listed before the trial court·31 times and on
each date, it had to be adjourned on the ground that one or the
other accused was not present. There are 16 accused in the
case. It is not clear from the record whether the accused were
not brought by _the police from the jail or that they were on bail
and had not appeared of their own, but the fact remains that the
complainants were not in any way instrumental in delaying the
D trial. between 2nd June, 2004 and 19th December, 2005. It was
brought to our notice that the only witness who has been
examined so far has turned hostile. Trial was stayed by the High
Court on 15th February, 2007 at the instance of the appellant as
Shri R.R. Trivedi, A.P.P., to whom the case had been assigned
E for conducting the trial and was allegedly the counsel for the
respondent in some other case earlier, continued to appear in "
the case in spite of the fact that he was replaced by another
A.P.P. It just shows that the trial was not progressing smoothly.
In any case, complainant party was in no way responsible for
F any delay in trial.
23. The third reason given by the High Court for grant of y
bail, that the respondent had been in jail for the last more than 2
years, is equally untenable in view of the observations made by
this Court in State of U.P vs. Amarmani Tripathi [(2005) 8 SCC
G 21):
"the condition laid down under Section 437(1 )(i) is sine + I'
qua non for granting bail even under Section 439 of the
Code. In the impugned order it is noticed that the High
Court has given the period of incarceration already ,...
H '
GOBARBHAI NARANBHAI SINGALA v. STATE OF
GUJARAT & ORS. [BHAN, J.]
143
undergone by the accused and the unlikelihood of trial A
concluding in the near future as grounds sufficient to
enlarge the accused on bail, in spite of the fact that the
accused stands charged of offences punishable with life
imprisonment or even death penalty In such cases, in
our opinion, the mere fact that the accused has B
undergone certain period of incarceration (three years
in this case) by itself would not entitle the accused to
being enlarged on bail, nor the fact that the trial is not
likely to be concluded in the near future either by itself
or coupled with the period of incarceration would be c
sufficient for enlarging the appellant on bail when the
gravity of the offence alleged is severe and there are
a/legations of tampering with the witnesses by the accused
during the period he was on bail."
[Italics is ours] 0
24. Shri Arun Jaitley, learned senior counsel appearing
for the respondents, submitted that this Court should not
ordinarily interfere in the matters relating to bail. It was pointed
out that in the last two years, the respondent has not misused
the liberty granted to him. There is no doubt that this Court does E
not ordinarily interfere in the matters granting bail but the same
is subject to certain exceptions. When the basic requirements
necessary for grant of bail are completely ignored by the High
Court, this Court would be justified in canceling the bail. In the
present case, three witnesses, who had allegedly seen the F
occurrence, have unequivocally in their statements under Section
161 Cr.P.C. have stated that the respondent, was present at the
time of occurrence and he had fired with his gun. Prima facie a
case for grant of bail was not made out.
25. This Court in Amarmani Tr!pathi's case (supra) had G
held that while considering the application. for bail, what is
required to be looked is, (i) whether there is any prima facie or
reasonable ground to believe that the accused had committed
the offence; (ii) nature and gravity of the charge; (iii) severity of
the punishment in the event of conviction; (iv) danger of accused H
A absconding or fleeing if released on bail; (v) character,
behaviour, means, position and standing of the accused; (vi)
likelihood of the offence being repeated; (vii) reasonable
apprehension of the witnesses being tampered with; and (viii)
danger, of course, of justice being thwarted by grant of bail.
26. In Panchanan Mishra v. Digambar Mishra, [(2005)
3 SCC 143], this Court while .considering the question of
.cancellation of bail, observed:
"The object underlying the cancellation of bail is to protect
the fair trial and secure justice being done to the society
by preventing the accused who is set at liberty by the bail
order from tampering with the evidence in the heinous
crime .... It hardly requires to be stated that once a person
is released on bail in serious criminal cases where the
punishment is quite stringent and deterrent, the accused
in order to get away from the clutches of the same indulge
in various activities like tampering with the prosecution
witnesses, threatening the family members of the
deceased victim and also create problems· of law and
. order situation."
27. We are of the view that the High Court has completely
ignored the general principles, for grant of bail in a heinous crime
of commission of murder in which the sentence, if convicted, is
death or life imprisonment.
28. In the second case, another learned Judge has granted
the bail by the impugned order which runs into 22 pages. The
findings recorded therein touch upon the merits of the case.
The learned Judge has proceeded as if an order of acquittal is
being passed. This Court in Amarmani Tripathi's case (supra)
G has held that a detailed examination of the evidence is to be
avoided while considering the question of bail, to ensure that
there is no pre-judging and no prejudice is caused. Only a brief
examination is to be done to satisfy about the facts and
ci'rcUmstances or otherwise of a prima facie case.
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t
J
GOBARBHAI NARANBHAI SINGALA v. STATE OF
GUJARAT & ORS. [BHAN, J.]
145
29. Taking the overall view of the entire matter and in A
particular to the antecedents of the respondent-Jayrajsinh
Temubha Jadeja, the alleged statements made by the witnesses,
who were present at the spot, to the police and the admitted
enmity between the parties (which is a double edged weapon
to commit the crime as well as to falsely implicate), .we are of B
the view that it was not a fit case to grant bail to the respondents
in this case as well. Without elaborating further, we set aside
the impugned orders granting bail to the respondents.
Respondents are directed to surrender to the judicial custody
forthwith. In case, the respondents do not surrender within seven c
days, steps be taken, in accordance with law, to apprehend them.
30. The counsel appearing for the State of Gujarat has
informed us that Shri R.R. Trivedi has been replaced by Ms.
Arnita Ben Sippy as the new A.P.P. to conduct the trial. She has
assured us that Shri R.R. Trivedi will not appear and conduct D
the trial in either of these two cases. Thus, the grievance of the
appellants on the basis of which the trial was stayed, stands
redressed. Stay of trial granted by the High Court on 15th
February, 2007 is vacated. Trial of the case to begin forthwith.
Trial Court is directed to take up the trial on day to day basis E
and, if possible, conclude the same within the next six months
from the date of production of a certified copy of this judgment.
The prosecution as well as defence counsel is directed to
cooperate in conducting the trial on day to day basis. In case,
any of the accused who is on bail and does not appear, then his F
bail be cancelled and he be taken into custody.
31. Nothing stated herein above be taken as an expression
of opinion on merits of the matter. The trial court shall proceed
with the trial in accordance with law, without in any manner being
influenced by the observations made herein above or in the G
Orders passed by the High Court granting bail to the
respondents.
32. With these observations, the appeals are allowed.
K.K.T. Appeals allowed. H