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Appeal against matter pertaining to grant of bail under Section 439 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 allowed by Supreme Court: Judgment in STATE REP. BY THE INSPECTOR OF POLICE VS M. MURUGESAN & ANR Criminal Appeal No 45 of 2020 dated 15.1.2020

A Bench of Judges of the Supreme Court Justice L. Nageswara Rao and Justice Hemant Gupta passed Judgment, in the case of Criminal Appeal No. 45 of 2020 in STATE (TAMILNADU) REP. BY THE INSPECTOR OF POLICE VS M. MURUGESAN & ANR filed by the State and Allowed appeal.

The facts of the case is the State is aggrieved against an order passed by the High Court of Judicature at Madras on 24th April, 2019 constituting a Heterogeneous Committee of named persons to give its recommendations on the reforms that can be brought into practice for reformation, rehabilitation and re-integration of the convict/accused person to society and best practices for improving the quality of investigation. The Committee was mandated to submit report within eight weeks and that the State was directed to furnish data for each District. The Committee was to scrutinize the same and submit the final data separately along with the report. The State was directed to provide office room for the Committee to conduct its meetings and to keep the documents and other materials in safe custody.

Such directions came to be passed in a matter pertaining to grant of bail under Section 439 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973. The High Court had admitted the accused to bail on 18th February, 2019 subject to certain conditions but passed an order to call for the details of the cases registered by the Police, final report filed, trial conducted and the result of such cases. The details were to bring to light the manner in which the entire criminal justice system is operating in the State. In pursuance of the directions so issued and the data provided, the impugned order was passed by the learned Single Bench.

The High Court after collecting the data in respect of the criminal cases registered, convictions and acquittals in each District proceeded to write a thesis on how the criminal justice system should function in the State. It was observed that the central aim of the criminal law is to reform the offender and to rehabilitate him in a bid to render him useful to society.

The matter before the High Court was as to whether the accused are entitled to be admitted to bail, that is the jurisdiction conferred on the Court in terms of Section 439 of the Code. Before granting bail, the High Court is enjoined upon an obligation to issue notice of an application for bail to the Public Prosecutor if a person is accused of an offence which is triable exclusively by the Court of Session or which, though not so triable, for punishment of imprisonment for life.

 

 

Observation of the Supreme Court

We find that the Hon'ble Single Bench has committed grave illegality in retaining the file after grant of bail to the accused on 18th February, 2019. The jurisdiction of the High Court came to an end when an application for grant of bail under Section 439 of the Code was finally decided.

In State of Punjab v. Davinder Pal Singh Bhullar & Ors. , the High Court of Punjab & Haryana after deciding a criminal appeal continued to pass order in respect of offenders in other cases not connected with the matter which was dealt with by the High Court. This Court deprecated the invocation of jurisdiction in a matter not connected with the appeal and that too after passing of the final order.

This Court in Davinder Pal Singh Bhullar referred to a case reported as Simrikhia v. Dolley Mukherjee and Chhabi Mukherjee & Anr. wherein the Court observed that inherent powers under Section 482 of the Code cannot be exercised to do something which is expressly barred under the Code. It was held that inherent powers cannot be exercised assuming that the statute conferred an unfettered and arbitrary jurisdiction, nor can the High Court act at its whim or caprice. The Code does not confer unlimited/unfettered jurisdiction on the High Court as the "ends of justice" and "abuse of the process of the court" have to be dealt with in accordance with law and not otherwise. The High Court has not been given nor does it possess any inherent power to
make any order, which in the opinion of the court, could be in the interest of justice as the statutory provision is not intended to bypass the procedure prescribed. It was also held that the High Court can always issue appropriate direction in exercise of its power under Article 226 of the Constitution of India at the behest of an aggrieved person, if the court is convinced that the power of investigation has been exercised by an investigating officer mala fide or the matter is not investigated at all, but even in such a case, the High Court cannot direct the police as to how the investigation is to be conducted but can insist only for the observance of due process as provided in the Code.

This Court in a judgment reported as Sangitaben Shaileshbhai Datanta v. State of Gujarat was examining a question where a court after grant of bail to an accused ordered the accused and their relatives to undergo scientific test viz. lie detector, brain mapping and Narco-Analysis. This Court held that direction of the court to carry out such tests is not only in contravention to the first principles of criminal law jurisprudence but also violates statutory requirements.

 

 

Opinion and decision of the Supreme Court

We find that learned Single Judge has collated data from the State and made it part of the order after the decision of the bail application as if the Court had the inherent jurisdiction to pass any order under the guise of improving the criminal justice system in the State. The jurisdiction of the Court under Section 439 of the Code is limited to grant or not to grant bail pending trial. Even though the object of the Hon'ble Judge was laudable but the jurisdiction exercised was clearly erroneous. The effort made by the Hon'ble Judge may be academically proper to be presented at an appropriate forum but such directions could not be issued under the colour of office of the Court.

In view of the above, we find that the order passed by the High Court on 24th April, 2019 is not sustainable in law and the same is set aside. Consequently, the appeal is allowed.

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