The authorities should have been given freedom to chalk out such measures as are necessary to protect the health of the person who would be subjected to interrogatory process.

ORDER

Thomas, J.

1. Special leave granted. These two appeals are directed against an order passed by the Delhi High Court which interfered with the order passed by a Sessions Judge dismissing a petition filed by one businessman called Ashok Kumar Jain (who will be referred to as the respondent) for pre-arrest bail.

2. Some officials of the Enforcement Directorate under the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act, 1973 (FERA for short) conducted a raid in the residential premises of the respondent on 4.1.1997 and seized certain documents which they considered very useful for unearthing instances of large scale FERA violations. The said raid was followed by a few other raids and the Enforcement Directorate (for convenience it is referred to as "the Directorate") has now started investigation into the alleged FERA violations against the respondent involving millions of US Dollars. Summons were issued to the respondent to appear before the Directorate for interrogation. On 5-1-1997 respondent left India. Though summons were repeated many times respondent did not reciprocate to anyone of them and instead he moved the Sessions Court of Delhi for anticipatory bail, In the application (for anticipatory bail) he highlighted his deteriorating health condition as the main ground for granting him bail. However, the Sessions Court dismissed the application and in so doing learned Sessions Judge made the following observations:

"Anticipatory bail definitely hamper the proper and effective investigation. Therefore, extra care and caution has to be taken while dealing with the application for grant of pre-arrest bail. The demand of an individuals liberty has to be matched with the larger interest of the public and the State. For instance, in the instant case, there are allegations of clandestine siphoning of big amount of precious foreign exchange. Such an offence is against the whole nation. The investigators have to be given full freedom for investigation. The allegations against the petitioner being of very grave and serious nature, the grant of anticipatory bail to this accused will certainly hamper proper investigation. The need for providing medical care and attention to the petitioner, in view of his past medical history, will be taken care of by the department even by the jail authorities in the event of his arrest. Such assurances have been given by the department." 3. Respondent moved Delhi High Court challenging the aforementioned order. He made a strong plea for a pre-arrest bail order on the strength of medical reports obtained from his cardiologists. Learned single judge, though expressed his view in the order under challenge that the Directorate can arrest the respondent and carry out custodial interrogation, has passed a condition that such arrest shall be "subject to the opinion of the cardiologists of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS)".

4. Learned single judge further observed that in case the Directorate considers custodial interrogation of the respondent necessary "it should approach the Director, AIIMS to constitute a Board of cardiologists to examine the respondent" and if the said Board reaches the opinion that custodial interrogation is not feasible "in that event it will be open to the officials to interrogate him under the care of the doctors at the AIIMS." Studded with such conditions learned single judge modified the order of the Sessions Court. The Directorate has filed this appeal aggrieved by such conditions and the respondent filed the other appeal aggrieved by the refusal to grant anticipatory bail.

5. This is not a fit case for granting anticipatory bail to the respondent and the Sessions Court as well as the High Court have rightly declined to grant such pre-arrest bail order to the respondent. Hence we proceed to consider whether learned single judge of the High Court has gone wrong in imposing conditions on the Directorate regarding to manner in which interrogation of the respondent is to be modu