The Calcutta High Court on Friday granted bail to Abdul Kalim alias Azad, who had been in custody since 2016 on accusations of being a member of the banned Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB). Arrested by the Special Task Force (STF) of Kolkata Police, Azad’s prolonged detention and the extended delay in the trial proceedings prompted his legal counsel to seek bail, citing that he had already been in jail for over eight years without a foreseeable conclusion to his trial.
During the hearing, the state’s attorney highlighted that Azad was previously convicted in connection to the 2014 Khagragarh blast, a case investigated by the National Investigation Agency (NIA), which resulted in his eight-year imprisonment sentence. The blast, which occurred in a house in Burdwan district of West Bengal, killed two individuals and was linked to the activities of the JMB.
Azad’s defense argued that he had served the entirety of his sentence from the previous conviction and that, should he be convicted in the ongoing case, he is entitled to have the sentences run concurrently. This argument was pivotal in the court’s decision to grant bail.
Presiding justices Joymalya Bagchi and Gaurang Kanth acknowledged the gravity of the allegations against Azad, specifically his alleged affiliation with a proscribed organization. However, the bench pointed out that no direct actions were attributed to Azad in the charges, and that the evidence against him largely rested on the unverified statements of a co-accused, which lacked corroboration.
The justices further reasoned that, given the indefinite timeline for the trial’s conclusion and considering Azad’s time already served under a previous conviction, bail was justified. The court stipulated that Azad must furnish two sureties of Rs 10,000 each and restricted his movement to within the jurisdictions of Kolkata and South 24 Parganas districts. Additionally, he is required to report weekly to the officer-in-charge of the state STF.
