The discretion of the judge in granting bail, the need for judicious consideration of bail petitions, and the imposition of stringent conditions to prevent misuse of bail.

JUDGMENT

Anoop Chitkara, J.

1. The petitioner, incarcerating upon his arrest in the FIR captioned above, has come up before this Court under Section 439 of Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (CrPC) seeking bail.

2. As per bail application and paragraph 9 of the status report of the State, the petitioner has following criminal history:-

3. Ld. Counsel for the petitioner contends that petitioner be granted bail with a condition that in case he repeats the offence, such bail would be cancelled.

4. Ld. counsel appearing for the State contends that the petitioner acted in furtherance of common intention and does not deserve bail. Ld. counsel opposes the bail also because the petitioner has criminal antecedents, and bail encourages habitual offenders.

REASONING:

5. 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.

6. 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history, the prosecutions resulting in acquittal or discharge, or when Courts quashed the FIR; the prosecution stands withdrawn, or prosecution filed a closure report; cannot be included.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.

7. Although the petitioner has been arraigned as an accused with the aid of section 34 of IPC and prima facie shares common intention, yet the injury attributed to him is causing blow with an iron rod on the thumb of the injured. The pistol fires were explicitly attributed to Fateh Singh alias Juvraj. The petitioner is in custody since 13th May 2021, and coupled with 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.

8. 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 justifying the grant or refusal of bail. In Kalyan Chandra Sarkar v Rajesh Ranjan @ Pappu Yadav, 2005 (2) SCC 42, (Para 18) a three-member Bench of Supreme Court held that the persons accused of non-bailable offences are entitled to bail if the Court concerned concludes that the prosecution has failed to establish a prima facie case against him, or despite the existence of a prima facie case, the Court records reasons for its satisfaction for the need to release such person on bail, in the given fact situations. The rejection o