IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Reserved on: 13.01.2025 Pronounced on: 30.01.2025 Ravi Kumar Choudhary ...Petitioner Versus State of Haryana …Respondent CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE ANOOP CHITKARA Present: Mr. Akshay Kumar Dahiya, Advocate for Mr. Gurnoor S. Sandhu, Advocate for the petitioner.

Mr. Naveen K. Sheoran, D.A.G., Haryana.

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ANOOP CHITKARA, J.

FIR No. Dated Police Station Sections

257 09.07.2017 Kundali, Sonipat 15 of NDPS Act and 420, 467, 468, 471, 120-B and 34 IPC

1. The petitioner apprehending arrest in the FIR captioned above, has come up before this Court under Section 482 of Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, [BNSS], seeking anticipatory bail.

2. In paragraph 17 of the bail petition, the accused declares that he has no criminal antecedents, however as per paragraph 16 of the reply, the accused has the following criminal antecedent:-

Sr. No. FIR No. Date Offenses Police Station

1. 890 22.12.2022 174-A IPC Kundli, Sonipat

3. The primary rider for the petitioner who seeks anticipatory bail is that he was declared as a proclaimed person. As per para no.7 of the reply dated 10.01.2025, the Judicial Magistrate Ist Class vide order dated 28.03.2018 declared petitioner, Ravi, Sunil and Mukesh Bhalotia as proclaimed persons. Subsequently, PO challan was submitted against them on 19.05.2018. In para no.9 of the reply, it has been mentioned that Sunil @ Topy had approached this Court by filing CRM-M No.51996 of 2019 and vide order dated 06.12.2019, he was granted interim anticipatory bail and joined investigation and was released on interim bail and the same was made absolute on 01.07.2021 by a Co- ordinate Bench. Subsequently, even the supplementary challan was filed against Sunil and submitted in the Court. Although the criminal trial against the accused qua which it was started namely Suresh Kumar, Dashrath, Deepak and Narender Tyagi was concluded vide judgment dated 22.08.2023 in which accused Dashrath Jain and Narender Tyagi were acquitted whereas accused Mukesh and Suresh were convicted under Section 15 of NDPS Act and Deepak was convicted under Section 29 of NDPS Act.

4. As per para no.11 of the reply, trial against accused Sunil Kumar @ Topy and Bal Krishan is pending in the court of Additional Sessions Judge for prosecution evidence and charges against them have been framed vide order dated 19.07.2022. As per para no.12 of the reply, accused Mukesh Bhalotia was also granted anticipatory bail by this Court in CRM-M No.44057 of 2024 vide order dated 29.11.2024. Perusal of order dated 29.11.2024 does not mention that the petitioner was proclaimed person and this Court while granting bail was oblivious of the fact that petitioner was a proclaimed person and this Court while granting bail was oblivious of the fact that Mukesh Bhalotia was a proclaimed person, as such petitioner is not entitled to bail on parity with co-accused Mukesh. Further it is not clear that whether proclamation order of Mukesh Bhalotia had been quashed or not.

5. In the bail petition, petitioner has concealed that he was declared as proclaimed person. It appears that he wanted to take advantage of the bail granted to co-accused Mukesh Bhalotia who had also adopted the similar tactics or probably had got his proclamation order quashed. In any circumstances the bail granted to co-accused cannot be a ground to grant bail to the petitioner when this Court is fully aware of the fact that petitioner was proclaimed person and the fact despite in the knowledge of the petitioner was intentionally concealed from the Court. Even after filing of reply, no counter reply/replication was filed by the petitioner contradicting such stand or annexing any document which would suggest that proclamation order had been quashed or set aside. Despite the fact that two of the similarly placed co-accused were acquitted by the trial Court and similarly placed co-accused got anticipatory bail, the remedy before the petitioner is to first get the procla