The court emphasized the need to balance individual liberty with the interests of society and highlighted the importance of carefully evaluating the facts of the case before granting anticipatory bail.

JUDGMENT

Rajnish Bhatnagar, J. - By way of this order, I shall dispose of the present petition filed under Section 438 read with section 482 Cr.P.C. on behalf of the petitioner for grant of anticipatory bail in case FIR No. 422/2020 U/s 279/186/353/307/332 IPC registered at Police Station Sarita Vihar.

2. Briefly stated, the facts of the case are that in the intervening night of 3-4 November, 2020, Ct. Jitender No. 2299/SE and Ct. Ankur No. 1741/SE were on patrolling duty on service bike with regd. No. DL1SAA3168 and No. DL1SAA 9203 respectively. At about 12:05 a.m., both police officials reached at H-Pocket market, Sarita Vihar. They saw that one BMW car bearing regd. No. HR 51 BU 0059 was parked near PNB ATM. There was a cake on the said car and few boys were making noise. Ct. Jitender and Ct. Ankur asked them not to make noise and requested to go their homes. They did not leave the said place and even started arguing and abusing with police officer and said "HUM YAHA KE LOKAL HAI, HAME KAUN ROK SAKTA HAI. AUR HUM YHAHI KHULE ME JANAM DIN PARTY KARENGE. Thereafter, Ct. Ankur called ERV staff of PS Sarita Vihar. On seeing ERV vehicle, they ran towards Janta Flats, Madanpur Khadar. They were followed by ERV. Offending car took a turn near K-Pocket divider and ran towards ABC pocket, Sarita Vihar. Ct. jitender and Ct. Ankur signaled them to stop but car driver tried to hit Ankur, who jumped and saved himself. Thereafter car driver, hit the car bearing No. HR51BU0059 to Ct. Jitender and ran over the car upon him which crushed his both legs and ran away. Thereafter, the said car was found hitting a juice corner near Umer Masjid, Khadar Mode. One person was also found injured on this spot too. On inspecting the car, it was found that door of the car was open. Beer bottle and namkeen was also lying inside the car. In this regard a case U/s 279/186/353/332/ 307/427/34 IPC was registered. The alleged vehicle i.e. BMW car and one i-phone was taken into possession and deposited in Malkhana of police station.

3. During investigation MLC of Ct. Jitender was deposited at Apollo Hospital, on which doctor opined the nature of injury as grievous. During the course of investigation, accused Kuldeep Bidhudi S/o Ved Prakash was arrested and during interrogation, he stated that 04.11.2020 was his birthday. He went to Nawada village Faridabad in his Scorpio car to his cousin home Satish Bhadana at about 8 p.m and taken BMW car from him and left his Scorpio car there. Thereafter he picked petitioner from Sundar Public School, Madanpur Khadar in his car and reached at H-Pocket, Market, Sarita Vihar. Thereafter their other friends also joined them and they started celebrating his birthday party. All friends consumed liquor and were bursting fire crackers on the road.

4. During investigation, notice U/s 41 A Cr.P.C. was served on the petitioner/accused to join the investigation but he did not join and despite the best efforts, the petitioner/accused could not be arrested as he was not found residing at his address and intentionally hiding himself. On 03.12.2020, NBW issued by the Court of Ms. Deepali Srivastva, Ld. MM, Saket Court against petitioner/accused and other associates but the same remained unexecuted as all the accused are still at large and evading their arrest. Further on 14.12.2020, proclamation U/s 82 Cr.P.C of petitioner was issued by the Court.

5. The petitioner/accused filed anticipatory bail application before the ASJ Court and the court directed him to join investigation. Accordingly on 06.01.2021, he joined the investigation and during interrogation, he stated that on 03.11.2020 at about 11:30 p.m., he had gone alone on foot to H-pocket market to celebrate Kuldeep Bidhuri birthday. He was neither driving nor sitting in BMW car. After the birthday party, he went straight alone to his house on foot.

6. According to the prosecution, the petitioner joined the investigation but had not co-operated in the investigation and just in order to ma