Has No Criminal Antecedent To His Credit: Calcutta HC Grants Bail To TMC Leader Manik Bhattacharya In Recruitment Scam Case
|The Calcutta High Court has granted bail to TMC (Trinamool Congress) leader Manik Bhattacharya in the recruitment scam case.
The accused, erstwhile President of the West Bengal Board of Primary Education and a Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) had approached the Court, seeking bail.
A Single Bench of Justice Suvra Ghosh said, “With regard to the apprehension of the petitioner influencing the witnesses, stringent conditions can be imposed upon him to address the concern. The attendance of the petitioner may also be secured by imposing stringent conditions. The petitioner has no criminal antecedent to his credit and no other criminal case except the present one is pending against him.”
The petitioner/accused appeared in-person while Advocates Phiroze Edulji and Anamika Pandey represented the respondent/Enforcement Directorate (ED).
In this case, the petitioner-accused was arrested for the alleged commission of the offence under Section 3 read with Section 70 and punishable under Section 4 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA). He submitted that he was arrested on the basis of a letter disclosing an allegation against him that he received Rs. 7 lakhs from 44 candidates and also the statement recorded under Section 50 of PMLA of one of the co-accused Tapas Kumar Mondal. The petitioner’s prayer for bail was turned down by the High Court on two occasions in June and November 2023. He renewed his prayer for bail on the ground of subsequent developments in the case.
The High Court after hearing the submissions of the parties, observed, “In the authority in Manik Madhukar Sarve and Others v/s. Vitthal Damuji Meher and Others in Criminal Appeal no. 3573 of 2024, the Hon’ble Supreme Court has held that in case of Commission of an economic offence affecting a large number of people, it would be fit for the Court to impose strict additional conditions in granting bail to the accused. The bail of the accused was cancelled by the Hon’ble Court on such ground coupled with the fact that the bail petition was not considered in its proper perspective. The facts and circumstances of the said case can be distinguished from that of the present case.”
The Court referred to the judgment of the Supreme Court in Criminal Appeal no. 2790 of 2024 wherein it was set out that a Constitutional Court cannot be restrained from granting bail to an accused on account of restrictive statutory provisions in a penal statute if it finds that the right of the accused-undertrial under Article 21 of the Constitution has been infringed, and in that event, such statutory restrictions would not come in the way.
“In the backdrop of the subsequent development/change of circumstances as well as the observation of the Hon’ble Supreme Court with regard to the right to speedy trial under Article 21 of the Constitution as well as prolonged incarceration, this Court is inclined to release the petitioner on bail subject to stringent conditions”, it remarked.
Accordingly, the High Court allowed the petition, granted bail to the accused upon furnishing a bond of Rs. 10 lakhs, and imposed stringent conditions.
Cause Title- Manik Bhattacharya v. Enforcement Directorate Kolkata Zonal Office-II