New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday slammed the Gujarat government for failing to file an appeal against the high court order, granting bail to two persons, accused of flogging a Dalit man to death, on the outskirts of Rajkot, in 2018.
According to the police, Mukeshbhai, was tied to the gate of a factory owned by Jayshukh Radadiya and allegedly beaten to death by Radadiya, Chirag Vora, Divyesh Vora, Tejas Zala and a minor. The entire incident was recorded on the CCTV footage and the mobile phone.
A bench comprising Justices M.R. Shah and B.V. Nagarathna set aside the high court order granting bail to Zala and Radadiya, and criticised the state government for failing to file an appeal against the order in such a serious matter.
“We may observe that by not filing the appeals by the state against the impugned judgments and orders releasing the accused on bail in such a serious matter, the state has failed to protect the rights of the victim. We are of the opinion that this was the fit case where the state ought to have preferred the appeals challenging the orders passed by the High Court releasing the accused on bail,” it said.
The bench observed that in criminal matters, the party who is treated as the aggrieved party is the state which is the custodian of the social interest of the community at large and so it is for the state to take all the steps necessary for bringing the person who has acted against the social interest of the community to book.
“The state ought to have been very serious even to maintain the rule of law in a serious matter like this where a person was brutally murdered/killed while he was just collecting scrap outside the factory with his wife and aunt. It is the duty of the Director of Prosecution and the state to ensure that the guilty are booked and punished,” it said.
The bench said: “We hope and trust that in future, the state government or Legal Department of state government and the Director of Prosecution shall take prompt decision in matters such as this and challenge the order passed by the trial court and/or the High Court as the case may be where it is found that the accused are released on bail in serious offences like the present.”
The top court judgment came on an appeal by the widow of the deceased against the judgments of the Gujarat High Court. The accused were murder facing charges and also charges under SC/ST Act, for allegedly killed the deceased who was collecting scrap from an open space behind a factory. The accused were denied bail by sessions court. Zala moved the High Court which allowed the plea and granted him bail and Radadiya was also granted bail mainly on the ground that Zala was on bail.
The top court said the high court order was unsustainable in law since it was “most perfunctory and casual” as it ignored the gravity of the offence. It also did not accept submissions of the accused who claimed more than two and a half years have passed, since they were granted bail, and there are no allegations of misuse of liberty and therefore, the bail may not be cancelled.
(IANS)
