138 IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Date of decision : 30.03.2026 Parminder Singh @ Parminder Bhatia .....Petitioner versus The State of Punjab ..... Respondent CORAM : HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RAJESH BHARDWAJ Present :- Ms. Deepika Verma, Advocate for Mr. Sanjeev K. Virk, Advocate for the petitioner.

Mr. K.D. Sachdeva, DAG, Punjab.

RAJESH BHARDWAJ , J. (Oral)

1. Present fourth petition has been filed praying for the grant of regular bail to the petitioner in case bearing FIR No.163 dated 27.10.2019, under Sections 420, 406 of IPC, 1860 and Section 4/5 of Prize Chits and Money Circulations Schemes (Banning) Act, 1978, registered at Police Station Satnampura, Phagwara, District Kapurthala.

2. Succinctly, facts of the case are that Parminder Singh @ Parminder Bhatia (present petitioner) and his co-accused, who are non- applicants i.e. Charanjit Singh and Tarsem Singh got registered a Firm under the name and style of Guru Nanak Task Enterprises at Prime Tower Hadiabad Road, Satnampura, Phagwara, District Kapurthala, as a finance company, but they under the pretext of running a finance company, started lucky draw schemes. They, from its members, collected a sum of Rs.1000/- per month and first scheme was for 13 months and second scheme was for 15 months. Thereafter, the prizes were distributed to the winners by putting draw and holding functions. They started that business without necessary sanction from the State Government. They also put the draws of luxury vehicles and got distributed some draws to the winners, but that were not distributed to the most of the winners. Accordingly, they cheated the innocent persons to the worth of crores to them. Thus, request was made to take legal action against the culprits. On registration of the FIR, investigation commenced. The petitioner was arrested on 18.10.2024. He approached the Court of learned Additional Sessions Judge, Kapurthala praying for grant of bail, however, after hearing counsel for the parties and finding no merits, the same was declined vide order dated 08.12.2025. Aggrieved by the same, petitioner earlier approached this Court twice by way of filing CRM-M- 11673-2024, CRM-M-44557-2024 and CRM-M-6918-2025, however, the same were dismissed vide orders dated 18.05.2024, 07.11.2025 and 27.10.2025, respectively. Hence, the petitioner is before this Court by way of filing the present fourth petition.

3. It has been contended by learned counsel for the petitioner that the petitioner has been falsely implicated in the present case. She has submitted that the petitioner was arrested on 18.10.2024. She has contended that the allegations as made in the FIR that the petitioner along with co- accused has registered a firm namely, M/s Guru Nanak Task Enterprises at Prime Tower and collected Rs.1000/- per month from every member and there were 2000 members enrolled. She has contended that the petitioner was merely a partner in the firm and not directly concerned with the collection of the amount. She has contended that the petitioner is behind the bars from last about 2½ years but there is no material progress in the trial. To buttress her arguments, she has submitted that the petitioner is not involved in any other case of the similar nature. She has submitted that it is a magisterial trial and the petitioner deserves to be granted the concession of regular bail.

4. Learned State counsel has vehemently opposed the submissions made by learned counsel for the petitioner. He has submitted that petitioner was involved along with co-accused. He has submitted that they in collusion with each other have opened a firm which is in violation under the Prize Chits and Money Circulations Schemes (Banning) Act, 1978. He has submitted that the offence has resulted in financial loss to the Nation. He has submitted that the complicity of the petitioner was surfaced during investigation. He, on instructions, has submitted that out of 24 prosecution witnesses, only 04 witnesses have been e