Point of Law: Orders of rejection of their applications for anticipatory bail - Challenged - Power of releasing an accused under Section 438 of Code of Criminal Procedure is the exceptional power and has to be used sparingly. The cases in which a law abiding citizen is adopting legal procedure, then such person/persons deserve to be protected.

JUDGMENT :

VIBHA KANKANWADI, J.

1. Heard both sides.

2. Since arguable points are made, the appeals are admitted.

3. By consent, the appeals are taken up for final disposal.

4. All these appeals have been filed by the appellants who have been added as an accused in Crime No. 04 of 2020, registered with Dhule Taluka Police Station, District Dhule, on 04-01-2020, for the offences punishable under Section 3 (1) (5) (8) (9) (13) of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989. The said First Information Report has been lodged by the present respondent No. 2. All the appellants had approached the learned Special Judge for anticipatory bail under Section 438 of Code of Criminal Procedure by filing Criminal Bail Applications No. 28 of 2020, No. 27 of 2020, No. 26 of 2020, and after hearing all the concerned parties, the learned Special Judge has rejected all those applications on 04-02-2020. Hence, present appeals have been filed under Section 14-A of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 (hereinafter referred to as ‘Atrocities Act’) challenging the said orders of rejection of their applications for anticipatory bail.

5. Heard learned Advocate Mr. S.S. Jadhav holding for Mr. A.D. Mane and Mr. M.V. Bhamre for appellants, learned Additional Public Prosecutor Mr. A.V. Deshmukh and learned Advocate Mr. A.S. Savale for respondent No. 2-original informant.

6. It has been vehemently submitted on behalf of the appellants that the appellants have been falsely implicated by the respondent No. 2 and it is the out come of the longstanding litigation between them. There are also other criminal cases filed between the appellants and the respondent No. 2. It is alleged that the incident giving rise to the alleged offence occurred between 2012 to 2014, however the private complaint i.e. Miscellaneous Criminal Application came to be filed by the respondent No. 2 in 2018 that is after delay of about four years, that delay has not been explained at all by the respondent No. 2 in his complaint. Taking into consideration the said delay and also the fact that the respondent No. 2 himself is an Advocate by profession, it raises doubt regarding the filing of such private complaint. It can be seen that the said complaint has not been filed with bona fide intention but just only to harass the appellants. The custodial interrogation of the appellants is absolutely not required. The learned Special Judge erred in holding that prima facie case has been made out under the Atrocities Act and, therefore, the applications filed by the appellants for anticipatory bail were barred under Section 18 of the Atrocities Act. Learned Advocate for the appellants, therefore, prayed for setting aside the impugned orders and grant of anticipatory bail to the appellants. He also submitted that some of the accused persons are the government officers who were holding the post of Talathi and Sub-Divisional Officer, how they could had intention to commit any offence merely because the complainant/respondent No. 2 is belonging to a particular caste, this aspect has not been considered by the learned Special Judge. So also as regards the other accused persons are concerned, they are fighting for their rights in the Courts of Law and it cannot be taken as the act of intentionally restraining the member of Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe from enjoying his land with the sole reason that he is belonging to a particular caste. Therefore, there was no bar for the entertainment of the applications, so also there is no bar for entertaining the appeals.

7. Per contra, the learned Additional Public Prosecutor as well as learned Advocate for respondent No. 2 vehemently submitted that perusal of the First Information Report and the private complaint that was lodged with the Special Judge would show that the accused No. 1 to 3 had conspired with accused No. 8 and 9 who were the Government Officers and restrained the resp