The Supreme Court on Friday, taking exception to a bail matter being adjourned 21 times by the Allahabad High Court, reiterated that cases concerning personal liberty must be decided expeditiously. A bench comprising Chief Justice B R Gavai and Justices N V Anjaria and Alok Aradhe urged the Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court to personally look into the matter to ensure its prompt disposal.
The Court was hearing a plea filed by an individual named Kuldeep. During the proceedings, his counsel informed the bench that the hearing on his bail application in the High Court had been adjourned on 21 separate occasions, with the next hearing posted after a period of two months.
The petitioner’s counsel drew the Court’s attention to a recent case where the Supreme Court had granted bail to an accused after noting that the bail hearing had been deferred 43 times by the High Court. Responding to this, the Chief Justice of India noted that he had previously asked the Chief Justice of the High Court to personally address that situation.
In the present case, while the Supreme Court declined to grant bail directly, it issued a clear directive to the High Court. The bench stated, “Time and again, we have been saying matters regarding personal liberty of citizens must be heard and decided expeditiously. Thus, we request the Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court to handle the case expeditiously.”
Ensuring the matter would be taken up, the bench added, “Needless to say that at least on the next date of hearing, the high court will take the matter and decide the bail application.” The Court also granted liberty to the accused, stating that if he is still aggrieved after the next hearing, he could return to the Supreme Court.
The bench’s observations are consistent with the CJI’s recent stance deprecating the practice of repeatedly adjourning matters of personal liberty. In the aforementioned case of Ramnath Mishra, who had been in custody for over three-and-a-half years, the Supreme Court granted bail on August 25 after observing the 43 adjournments.
In that order, the CJI had remarked, “We do not appreciate the tendency of the High Court to adjourn the matters pertaining to personal liberty of a citizen on such a large number of occasions. Time and again we have observed that the matters relating to personal liberty should be entertained by the Courts with utmost speed.”
