The main legal point established in the judgment is that the court may grant anticipatory bail while imposing stringent conditions to ensure the accused's cooperation with the investigation and prevent potential misconduct, considering the criminal antecedents and the nature of the offenses.

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 13 of the bail application, the accused declares the following criminal antecedents:

(i) The petitioner is involved in one other case i.e. FIR No. 114 dated 02.06.2017 and he is on interim anticipatory bail in the said FIR.

3. The matter pertains to an agreement to sell of the year 2015, which was revalidated in 2022. Pertaining to this transaction, one FIR was registered against the petitioner's father in 2017, and he has filed its quashing petition.

4. Ld. Counsel for the petitioner states that if this court imposes any condition on sale of land, then he would have no objection to it but bail be granted. Ld. counsel further 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. The contention on behalf of the complainant is that if this court grants permission, it should be subject to stringent conditions.

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. Given the undertaking by the petitioner not to sell the land, during the pendency of the trial to anyone except in terms of the agreement in question, the delay in complaint, and other factors and circumstances 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. Furthermore, a prima facie perusal of paragraph 2 & 3 of the bail petition reveals sufficient grounds for granting bail.

9. In the present case, the maximum sentence imposable for the offences mentioned in FIR does not exceed seven years. Thus, directions passed in Arnesh Kumar v. State of Bihar, (2014) 8 SCC 273, (Para 13), apply to this petition, wherein Hon'ble Supreme Court directed all the State Governments to instruct its police officers not to arrest the accused automatically when the offence is punishable with imprisonment