The nature of accusations, severity of the punishment, and the character of the accused must be considered while granting bail. The change in the nature of the offence can disentitle the accused to the liberty granted for a minor offence.

M.L. Mehta, J.

1. This revision petition assails the order dated 17th November, 2011 of Special CBI Judge whereby on the application of the Complainant, the bail granted to the petitioners was cancelled in CBI Case RC No. 6/2009 under Section 120-B read with Sections 302/364/201/218 IPC registered at P.S. Dalanwala, Dehradun. 18 persons were arrayed as accused Nos. 1 to 18. Accused at serial No. 1 to 7 were granted bail by the High Court of Uttrakhand on 20th January, 2010. Aggrieved thereby, the complainant who is the father of the deceased filed two petitions before the hon’ble Supreme Court. One of those petitions was for transfer of the case from Dehradun and another was for cancellation of the bail of the accused persons 1 to 7 granted by the Uttrakhand High Court.

2. The Hon’ble Supreme Court vide its order dated 17th March, 2011 set aside the order of granting bail to the accused 1 to 7 and transferred the said case from Uttrakhand to Delhi. This decision of the Supreme Court is reported in Ravinder Pal Singh vs. Ajit Singh & Ors. 2011(4) SCC 238.

3. The present petitioners are the accused at serial No. 8 to 18 in the said case. They were granted bail by the Sessions Judge, Dehradun vide orders dated 1st May, 2010 and 13th May, 2010. The operative part of both the orders is as under:-

“Ld. Public Prosecutor, CBI, Dehradun has submitted his arguments in the light of the report of the IO, a brief description of which has been given above. Ld. Public Prosecutor has submitted that the IO has clearly stated that the above accused persons have committed the substantive offence under Section 201 IPC by giving false information to screen the offenders of Section 364/302 IPC. An offence i.e. U/s 201 IPC entails punishment upto seven years (and fine) and three years (and fine) in different contingencies. According to the First Schedule of Cr.P.C. an offence u/s 201 IPC is a bailable offence although triable by the Court of sessions. Considering above aspect of the matter, the applicant/accused persons deserve bail”.

4. After the transfer of the case from Dehradun to Delhi, the charges were framed by the learned Special Judge against all the accused persons under Section 120-B read with Section 304/302/201/218 IPC. The learned Special Judge for cancelling the bail of the petitioners vide impugned order reasoned that when the petitioners were granted bail by the Sessions Judge, Dehradun they were charge-sheeted under Section 218 IPC for the substantive offence, which was bailable and now since the charges against the petitioners and all the other accused have been framed under Section 120-B read with Section 304/302/201/218, which are non-bailable, the benefit of bail granted to them earlier by Dehradun Court, was not available.

5. In the case of Prahalad Singh Bhati Vs. NCT of Delhi, AIR 2001 SC 1444, it has been held that the jurisdiction to grant bail has to be exercised on the basis of well-settled principles having regard to the circumstances of each case and not in a arbitrary manner. While granting bail, the court has to keep in mind the nature of accusations, the nature of evidence in support thereof, the severity of the punishment which conviction will entail, the character, behaviour, means and standing of the accused, circumstances which are peculiar to the accused, reasonable possibility of securing the presence of the accused in the trial, reasonable apprehension of the witnesses being tampered with, the larger interest of the public or the State and similar other considerations. In the present case, the Hon’ble Supreme Court held that enlarging the accused in case of murder on bail merely on the grounds that he was initially granted bail for the minor offence, was not proper when an aggravated charge under Section 302 IPC was added to the charge sheet. It was held thus:

“9….. the mere initial grant of anticipatory bail for lesser offence did not entitle the respondent to insist for regular bail even if he was subse