The court may grant anticipatory bail with stringent conditions to prevent the accused from influencing the investigation, tampering with evidence, or intimidating witnesses, considering the nature of the offence and the accused's criminal history.

JUDGMENT

Anoop Chitkara, J.

1. The petitioner apprehending arrest in the FIR captioned above has come up before this Court under Section 438 Cr.P.C seeking anticipatory bail.

2. In paragraph 7 of the bail application, the accused declares that he has no criminal history. However, Ld. Counsel for the petitioner states that it was due to some communication error, and in fact there were cases pending against him, and it was a bonafide mistake. Be that as it may, as per the status report in para 7, the accused has following criminal antecedents:

3. The accused along with 15-16 members of his gang, probably under intoxication, created ruckus in a shopping Mall, broke its property, and behaved in an uncivilized and indecent manner. They also snatched a gold chain, which was recovered and handed over to the aggrieved person.

4. Ld. Counsel for the petitioner contends that the custodial investigation would serve no purpose whatsoever, and the pre-trial incarceration would cause an irreversible injustice to the petitioner and family.

5. While opposing the bail, Ld. counsel representing the State contends that given the criminal past, the accused is likely to indulge in crime once released on bail.

REASONING:

6. In Maulana Mohd Amir Rashadi v. State of U.P., (2012) 3 SCC 382, Hon'ble Supreme Court holds,

[10] It is not in dispute and highlighted that the second respondent is a sitting Member of Parliament facing several criminal cases. It is also not in dispute that most of the cases ended in acquittal for want of proper witnesses or pending trial. As observed by the High Court, merely on the basis of criminal antecedents, the claim of the second respondent cannot be rejected. In other words, it is the duty of the Court to find out the role of the accused in the case in which he has been charged and other circumstances such as possibility of fleeing away from the jurisdiction of the Court etc.

7. In Paramjeet Singh v. State of Punjab, CRM-M 50243 of 2021, this court observed, While considering each bail petition of the accused with a criminal history, it throws an onerous responsibility upon the Courts to act judiciously with reasonableness because arbitrariness is the antithesis of law. The criminal history must be of cases where the accused was convicted, including the suspended sentences and all pending First Information Reports, wherein the bail petitioner stands arraigned as an accused. In reckoning the number of cases as criminal history, the prosecutions resulting in acquittal or discharge, or when Courts quashed the FIR; the prosecution stands withdrawn, or prosecution filed a closure report; cannot be included. Although crime is to be despised and not the criminal, yet for a recidivist, the contours of a playing field are marshy, and graver the criminal history, slushier the puddles.

8. Considering the nature of offence viz-a-viz the sentence prescribed in the statute book, and the other factors peculiar to this case, it may be appropriate to afford the petitioner a final opportunity to course-correct. Thus, the previous criminal history of the petitioner is not being considered strictly at this stage as a factor for denying bail.

9. In Gurbaksh Singh Sibbia v State of Punjab, 1980 (2) SCC 565, (Para 30), a Constitutional Bench of Supreme Court held that the bail decision must enter the cumulative effect of the variety of circumstances just