The court emphasized that bail should be granted unless justified by circumstances indicating a risk of fleeing or tampering with evidence, balancing the accused's liberty with the integrity of the trial.

JUDGMENT

Mr. Anoop Chitkara, J.

The petitioner, who is in custody from 11.4.2024 in the FIR captioned above has come up before this Court under Section 439 CrPC seeking bail.

2. In paragraph 35 of the bail petition, the accused declares that he has no criminal antecedents.

3. It would be appropriate to refer to para 3 of the bail petition, which reads as follows:

3. That the petitioner is filling the present regular bail petition directly before this Hon'ble Court in the wake of order dated 08.04.2024 passed by this Hon'ble Court in the petition bearing CRM-M-4430 of 2024 filed by the said firm for quashing of the aforesaid FIR. Even otherwise, this Hon'ble Court has concurrent jurisdiction to entertain and adjudicate the present regular bail petition in terms of provisions of Section 439 Cr.P.C. This is first petition for grant of regular bail.

4. The facts of the case are being taken from the reply dated 18.04.2024 filed by the concerned Deputy Superintendent of Police, which reads as follows:

"1. That there was source information to the effect that Government Revenue such as GST (CGST/SGST) & Royalty is being evaded by way of taking material from the mine at Ratewali, Panchkula in Trucks/Dumpers without issuing any bills and mining beyond permissible limit by M/s Tirupati Roadways Mine at village Ratewali. In order to verify the said source information, a team was formed who conducted Surprise Check on the site of M/s Tirupati Roadways Mine at village Ratewali on 11.05.2022. During the said check, relevant record/documents and data from the computers/desktops relating to bills i.e. E-Rawana bills etc. was seized. Perusal/scrutiny of the said record/data collected during the said Surprise Check by the team of Anti Corruption Bureau, Panchkula revealed that during the period of 06 days from 05.05.2022 to 11.05.2022, a total number of 1868 Trucks/Dumpers were found to have been taken out the material/mineral (i.e. Graval, Sand, Stone etc.) from the Mining Site of M/s Tirupati Roadway Mine. Whereas, bills mentioning CGST/SGST and Royalty etc. of only 518 Trucks/Dumper were found to be issued.

2. That in order to further ascertain the amount of illegal extraction of material/minerals, a survey/measurement was carried out with the help of officers/officers of HARSAC, Gurugram and the Mining Deptt., Haryana, Panchkula M/s Tirupati Roadways at Ratewali, Panchkula, Haryana on 13.05.2022 at the site of Mine in presence of officers of District Mining and Department Mining & Geology, Haryana to verify as to how much volume of material has been extracted from the said river/mine. Vide report No. HARSAC/GGM/2022/203-205 dated 06.06.2022 of the Principal Scientist, HARSAC, Gurugram the total volume extracted was reported to be 17,66,079.68 MT (47.66 LTPA) which as per the terms and conditions of tender comes out to be 5 - 6 times more than the permissible range.

3. That as per clause 21 (A) of the Specific Conditions of Environment Clearance letter No.J-11015/75/2017-IA. II(M) dated 21.02.2020 issued to M/s Tirupati Roadways, Rattewali, Panchkula, the permissible mining of river bed material (Boulder, Gravel and Sand) shall be limited to only 8.39 LTPA (8390000 MT) instead of requested 19 LTPA from an effective minable area of 24.25 Ha with a maximum minable depth of 1.33 Meters from the original ground level.

4. That as established, the total volume of material extracted by the owner of the firm M/s Tirupati Roadways at Rattewali, was 5-6 times more than the permissible limit in a year. Thus, a huge loss of about Rs. 35 Crores of revenue has been caused to the Government of Haryana by the owners of said firm by viol