VIDHYA NAND Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS petition under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure raises a significant question which frequently arises in the Subordinate Courts. Only a few facts need be stated in order to deal with the question of law. The petitioner was granted bail by the learned Additional Sessions Judge Sonepat, in a case under Section 20 of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 with the direction that he shall furnish a bond in the sum of Rs. 30, 000/- with two sureties in the like amount of Sonepat District. The petitioner belongs to a village in the Slate of Himachal Pradesh. He has no acquaintance in District Sonepat and he, therefore, filed the present petition seeking modification of the order that the learned trial Court does not insist on the sureties being of District Sonepat. The short question is whether it is open to the court to insist on sureties being of a particular district. This very question arose in Moti Ram and others v. State of Madhya Pradesh, AIR 1978 Supreme Court 1594. The petitioner in that case was a poor mason from Madhya Pradesh. Pending appeal in the Supreme Court, he was ordered to be released on bail to the satisfaction of the Chief Judicial Magistrate. Chief Judicial Magistrate ordered that a surety in the sum of Rs. 10,000/- be produced and further that the surety must be from his own District. The learned Chief Judicial Magistrate declined to accept the suretyship of the petitioner's brother because he and his assets were in another District. The petitioner moved the Supreme Court to modify the original order. It was held that it was not within the power of the Court to reject a surety because he or his assets were situated in a different District or a State. It was observed that there was no law prescribing geographical discrimination implicit in asking for surety from the same District. It was, therefore, held that the demand by the Chief Judicial Magistrate of sureties from his own District was discriminatory and illegal. The petitioner was allowed to be released on his furnishing a personal bond in the sum of Rs. 1,000/-. In view of the law laid down in Moti Ram's case (supra), there is no scope for any doubt or debate that the learned Additional Sessions Judge could not ask the petitioner to furnish sureties belonging to District Sonepat.

(2.) I may take this opportunity to make it clear that while the system of pecuniary bail had a tradition behind it, the time has come for rethinking on the subject. It may well be that in some cases no monetary suretyship but undertaking by a relation of the petitioner or organisation to which he belongs may be better and more socially relevant. I would also like to emphasise that while fixing the amount of bail the Court must have regard to the economic status of the accused. Requiring a heavy surety from a poor person is obviously wrong. It virtually denies to the accused what is sought to be given by the order of bail. In Moti Ram's case (supra) the Supreme Court observed that it shocks one's conscience to ask a mason like the petitioner in that case to furnish a surety for Rs 10,000/-. The Courts would do well to remember that the amount of bail should be fixed keeping in view the economic status and pecuniary resource of the accused and the Courts should also consider whether in the facts and circumstances of a certain case instead of monetary suretyship the accused should be released on an undertaking furnished by a relation of the petitioner.