IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH CRM-M-6926-2026 Date of decision: 01.04.2026 AZEEM ALI ALIAS AJJU ….Petitioner Versus STATE OF PUNJAB ....Respondent CORAM:- HON'BLE MS. JUSTICE RUPINDERJIT CHAHAL Present:- Ms. Ravisha Mahajan, Advocate for the petitioner.

Mr. Amit Shukla, DAG Punjab.

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RUPINDERJIT CHAHAL, J. (ORAL)

1. Prayer in the instant petition filed under Section 439 Cr.P.C. is for grant of regular bail to the petitioner in case FIR No.305 dated 21.12.2022 registered under Section 22(C) of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 (Sections 27A, 29, 61, 85 of the NDPS Act and Sections 420, 468, 471, 120-B, 34 IPC added later on) at Police Station Division-A, District Amritsar.

2. Brief facts of the present case, as per the prosecution, are that on 21.12.2022, Inspector Rajwinder Kaur along with her fellow police officials on the basis of secret information, apprehended one Nishan Sharma who was found in conscious possession of 29,920 intoxicant tablets. Initially, the FIR in question was registered against the said co-accused

3. Learned counsel for the petitioner contends that the petitioner has been falsely implicated in the present case and he has no concern with the said offence. She argued that the petitioner was neither present at the spot nor was named in the FIR. It has also been contended that the petitioner was nominated as an accused only on the basis of the disclosure statement made by co-accused. Apart from the disclosure statement, there is no other evidence to connect the petitioner with the offence in question and it is a trite law that disclosure statement of co-accused during his custodial interrogation is not admissible in evidence. No recovery is to be effected from him. The petitioner is in custody since 19.11.2025. The petitioner has clean antecedents as he is not involved in any other case. He further contends that co-accused has already been granted concession of bail by this Court vide order dated 12.02.2026 passed in CRM-M-54759-2025. The investigation in the case is complete; however challan has not yet been presented against the petitioner, as such trial will take a long time to conclude and no useful purpose would be served by keeping him behind bars. Therefore, it is urged that the petition deserves to be allowed.

4. Learned State counsel has filed the status report and custody certificate in the matter, which are taken on record. He has vehemently opposed the prayer for grant of bail by submitting that the offence committed by the petitioner is serious in nature and that the contraband recovered is commercial. However, he has not controverted the fact that the petitioner is first time offender as he is not involved in any other case.

5. A query was raised by this Court to learned State counsel as to whether apart from the disclosure statement, any material has been found during investigation to connect the petitioner with the recovered contraband, to which he answered that there is nothing else to connect the petitioner with the offence.

6. As far as the argument of learned counsel for the petitioner regarding nomination of accused on the basis of disclosure statement is concerned, it would be apposite to refer herein to a judgment passed by the Hon'ble Supreme Court titled as ‘Tofan Singh vs. State of Tamil Nadu, AIR

2020 Supreme Court 5592’, relevant whereof reads as under:

"155. We answer the reference by stating: (i) That the officers who are invested with powers under section 53 of the NDPS Act are "police officers within the meaning of section 25 of the Evidence Act, as a result of which any confessional statement made to them would be barred under the provisions of section 25 of the Evidence Act, and cannot be taken into account in order to convict an accused under the NDPS Act (ii) That a statement recorded under section 67 of the NDPS Act cannot be used as a confessional statement in the trial of an offence under the NDPS ACT".

7. More recently, the Hon'ble