State amendments in anticipatory bail provisions were impliedly repealed upon the enactment of new legislation, necessitating clarity on the maintainability of such applications in light of recent legal changes.

2. The instant bail application has been filed on behalf of the applicant with the prayer to grant him anticipatory bail in Case Crime No. 124 of 2021, under sections - 2 and 3 of U.P. Gangster Act P.S. - Kotwali District - Sitapur.

3. At the very outset, the objection regarding the maintainability of the instant application are raised in two folds. One that the applicant has moved this application directly to this Court, which is not maintainable as per the law laid down in case of Ankit Bharti Vs. State of U.P. anothers 2020 SCC OnLine All. 1949 and secondly, in light of the provision of sub-section 6(a)(b) of S.438 of CrPC, as amended by U.P. State legislature namely, U.P. State Amendment 2019, (Uttar Pradesh Amendment) Act, 2018 (U.P. Act No. 4 of 2019) (hereinafter referred to as 'Act, 2018, U.P. Act No. 4 of 2019') the benefit of provision of anticipatory bail is available in the matter pertaining to Gangster Act.

4. For summarising the issue, two questions can be formulated;

'I - Whether, the anticipatory bail application could directly be filed before this Court, under the facts and circumstances of the present case?

II - Whether, in light of the repealment of Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 (hereinafter referred to as 'CrPC 1973') and subsequently, the re - enactment of BNSS, 2023 (hereinafter referred to as ' Sanhita 2023 '), the Code of Criminal Procedure (Uttar Pradesh Amendment) Act, 2018 (U.P. Act No. 4 of 2019) with presidential assent, would stand repealed?

5. So long as the first objection is concerned, the plea has been taken by the applicant for not filing the anticipatory bail application before the Sessions Judge, Sitapur, that the rival, Satyanaran and his family or involved in the business of Brick - lin and Transport and more than fifteen first information reports have been lodged against the applicant and and further the brother - in - law of the applicant namely, Anand in animosity, has also lodged several first information reports against him. It has also been stated that the opponent of the applicant being financially and politically powerful, is pressurizing the police officers and moreover, they are also affecting the judicial proceeding before the trial court. The next ground for directly approaching this Court is that there is threat to life to the applicant as there are acute enmity in between the parties and the applicant is not safe to approach the learned District and Sessions Judge for anticipatory bail. On the aforesaid ground, it is prayed that the anticipatory bail application may directly be entertained by this Court.

6. The counsel for the opposite parties have contradicted and submitted that since, there is no special reason to approach this Court, directly, therefore, the application is liable to be dismissed.

7. The settled law in case of Ankit Bharti v. State of U.P. and another 2020 SCC OnLine All. 1949 laid down the law while answering the reference. The reference answered by the full bench of this Court reads as under: -

"16. The Reference, in that sense, was clearly not merited. However and since we have heard parties not only on the question of maintainability of the Reference but also on the questions formulated for our consideration, we deem it apposite to render our opinion in order to lend a quietus to the doubts which appear to exist.

17. We, therefore, hold that the conclusions as recorded in Vinod Kumar on the meaning to be ascribed to exceptional or special circumstances needs no reconsideration. It must, as was noted there, be left to the concerned Judge to exercise the discretion as vested in him by the statute dependent upon the facts obtaining in a particular case.

18. The second aspect which needs to be emphasized and reiterated is that Vinod Kumar itself while articulating some of the situations in which the High Court may be moved directly had underlined the necessity of those assertions being evidenced and substantiated in fact A bald assertion without requisite partic