IMPORTANT POINT
Seriousness of allegations are determinative of grant or refusal of bail but delay in commencement and completion of trial is also an important factor. Accused cannot be kept in custody for indefinite period.

JUDGMENT

ADARSH KUMAR GOEL, J.

1. Leave granted.

2. This appeal has been preferred against final judgment and order dated 11th August, 2014 passed by the High Court of Madhya Pradesh at Jabalpur in Misc. Criminal Case No.10371 of 2014 whereby a Division Bench of the High Court dismissed the bail application filed by the appellant.

3. M.P. Vyavsayik Pareeksha Mandal (M.P. Professional Examination Board) known as Vyapam conducts various tests for admission to professional courses and streams. It is a statutory body constituted under the provisions of M.P. Professional Examination Board Act, 2007. As per FIR No.12 of 2013 registered on 30th October, 2013 at police station, S.T.F., Bhopal under Sections 420, 467, 468, 471, 120B of the Indian Penal Code (“IPC”) read with Section 3(d), 1, 2/4 of the Madhya Pradesh Manyata Prapt Pariksha Adhiniyam, 1937 and under Sections 65 and 66 of the I.T. Act, Shri D.S. Baghel, DSP (STF), M.P. Police Headquarters, Bhopal during the investigation of another case found that copying was arranged in PMT Examination, 2012 at the instance of concerned officers of the Vyapam and middlemen who for monetary consideration helped the undeserving students to pass the entrance examination to get admission to the M.B.B.S course in Government and Private Medical Colleges in the State of M.P. As per the material collected during investigation, in pursuance of conspiracy, the appellant Dr. Vinod Bhandari, who is the Managing Director of Shri Aurbindo Institute of Medical Sciences, Indore, received money from the candidates through co-accused Pradeep Raghuvanshi who was working in Bhandari Hospital & Research Centre, Indore as General Manager and who was also looking after the admissions and management work of Shri Aurbindo Institute of Medical Sciences, Indore, for arranging the undeserving candidates to pass through the MBBS Entrance Examination by unfair means. He gave part of the money to Nitin Mohindra, Senior Systems Analyst in Vyapam, who was the custodian of the model answer key, along with Dr. Pankaj Trivedi, Controller of Vyapam. During investigation, disclosure statement was made by Pradeep Raghuvanshi which led to the recovery of money and documents. The candidates, their guardians, some officers of the Vyapam and middlemen were found to be involved in the scam. It appears that there are in all 516 accused out of which 329 persons have been arrested and 187 are due to be arrested. Substantial investigation has been completed and charge sheets filed but certain aspects are still being investigated and as per direction of this Court in a Petition for Special Leave to Appeal (C) …. CC No.16456 of 2014 titled “Ajay Dubey versus State of M.P. & Ors.”, final charge sheet is to be filed by the Special Task Force on or before March 15, 2015 against the remaining accused. Allegations also include that some high scorer candidates were arranged in the examination centre who could give correct answers and the candidates who paid money were permitted to do the copying. Other modus operandi adopted was to leave the OMR sheets blank which blank sheets were later filled up with the correct answers by the corrupt officers of Vyapam. Further, the model answer key was copied and made available to concerned candidates one night before the examination. Each candidate paid few lakhs of rupees to the middlemen and the money was shared by the middlemen with the officers of the Vyapam. The appellant received few crores of rupees in the process from undeserving candidates to get admission to the M.B.B.S. and, as per allegation in the other connected matter, i.e., FIR No.14 of 2013 registered on 20th November, 2013 with the same police station, to the PG medical courses.

4. In the present case, the appellant was arrested on 30th January, 2014 while in the other FIR he was granted anticipatory bail on 16th January, 2014. Second Bail application of the appellant in the present case was considered by the 9th Additional Sessions Ju