Bail – Forgery / manipulation of court records – Respondent no.2 was beneficiary of the same – FIR u/ss. 420, 467, 468, 471, 120-B IPC – Sessions Judge dismissed bail application of respondent no.2 – High Court, however, released him on bail – If justified – Held: High Court released respondent no.2 on bail in a routine and casual manner without adverting to the seriousness of the offence and the gravity of the matter relating to forgery and /or manipulation of the court order – It did not at all consider that respondent no.2 was charged for offences u/ss. 420, 467, 468, 471, 120-B IPC and that the maximum punishment for offence u/s. 467 IPC is 10 years and fine / imprisonment for life and even for offence u/s. 471 IPC the punishment is similar – If the court record is manipulated and/or forged, it will hamper the administration of justice – Forging/ manipulating the court record and taking benefit of the same stands on altogether a different footing than forging/manipulating other documents between two individuals – Considering the very serious allegations of forging/manipulating court order and respondent No.2 having taken advantage of the same, the High Court was not justified in releasing him on bail – Merely because the chargesheet was filed is no ground to release respondent no.2 on bail – Impugned judgment of High Court releasing respondent No.2 on bail accordingly unsustainable – IPC – ss. 420, 467, 468, 471, 120-B – Administration of Justice.
Allowing the appeal, the Court
HELD: 1. Respondent No. 2 – accused is facing the trial for the offences under Sections 420, 467, 468, 471, 120-B IPC. The FIR has been lodged by the record keeper of the court on the order passed by the District and Sessions Judge. The allegations are very serious of tampering and/or manipulating the court order and Respondent No. 2 has taken the benefit of such forged/manipulated court order in another case. After the investigation is concluded, the charge-sheet has been filed against Respondent No. 2 – accused and even the charges are also reported to be framed. Thus, a prima facie case is found against the accused for the aforesaid offences. [Para 8.1][61-E, F-H]
2. The High Court released accused on bail in a routine and casual manner and without adverting to the seriousness of the offence and the gravity of the matter relating to forgery and/or manipulating the court order. From the impugned judgment and order passed by the High Court it appears that it has only observed that since the innocence and complicity of the accused can be decided only after taking evidence with regard thereto, without commenting anything on merit as to the complicity, involvement and severeness of the offences, the case being triable by the Magistrate and the charge sheet having been filed and the accused is languishing in jail since 22.11.2018, is entitled to be released on bail. However, the High Court has not at all considered that the accused is charged for the offences under Section 420, 467, 468, 471, 120-B IPC and the maximum punishment for offence under Section 467 IPC is 10 years and fine/imprisonment for life and even for the offence under Section
471 IPC there is similar punishment. Apart from that, forging and/or manipulating the court record and getting benefit of such forged/manipulated court record is a very serious offence. If the court record is manipulated and/or forged, it will hamper the administration of justice. Forging/manipulating the court record and taking the benefit of the same stands on altogether a different footing than forging/manipulating other documents between two individuals. Therefore, the High Court ought to have been more cautious/serious in granting the bail to a person who is alleged to have forged/manipulated the court record and taken the benefit of such manipulated and forged court record more particularly when he has been charged-sheeted having found prima facie case and the charge has been framed. [Para 8.2][62-A-F]
3. Once respondent no.2 is the beneficiary of such forged/manipulated court order and having taken advantage of such order thereafter it will not be open for respondent no.2 to contend that it might have been done by his brother who was doing Pairokar on his behalf. [Para 8.3][63-B]
4. Suffice it is to say that in the facts and circumstances of the case and looking to the very serious allegations of forging/manipulating court order and having taken advantage of the same, the High Court is not justified in releasing Respondent No. 2 on bail. Merely because the charge-sheet is filed is no ground to release the accused on bail. The submission on behalf of the accused was that as the record is now in the court’s custody there is no chance of tampering, but the allegation against the respondent accused are of tampering/forging/manipulating the court record which was in the custody of the court. Seriousness of the offence is one of the relevant considerations while considering the grant of bail, which has not been considered at all by the High Court while releasing Respondent No. 2 – accused on bail. [Para 8.3][63-C-E]
5. In view of the aforesaid reasons, the impugned judgment and order passed by the High Court releasing Respondent No. 2 – accused on bail is unsustainable and deserves to be quashed and set aside and is accordingly set aside. [Para 9][64-A] P. Chidambaram v. Central Bureau of Investigation (2020) 13 SCC 337; Sharad T. Kabra v. Union of India (2018) 14 SCC 493; Seema Singh v. CBI & Anr. (2018)
16 SCC 10 : [2018] 3 SCR 355; Manish Solanki @
Bansi v. The State of Rajasthan (2019) 4 SCC 340; and Amanullah & Anr v. State of Bihar & Ors (2016) 6 SCC 699: [2016] 2 SCR 1027 – referred to.
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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