Central Bureau Of Investigation v. Nitin Prem Shahi And ANR.

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IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY

CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION CRIMINAL APPLICATION NO. 673 OF 2018 Central Bureau of Investigation .. Applicant

Versus

Nitin Prem Shahi and anr.

.. Respondents ...

Mr. Hiten S. Venegavkar for the applicant.

Mr. Vijay Agrawal a/w Yash Agrawal, Jasmin Purani, Mukul Malik, Sajid Sayed i/b Rahul Agrawal for Respondent No.1 in APPLN 673/2018 Ms. Anamika Malhotra, APP for Respondent No.2/State. CORAM: BHARATI DANGRE, J.

DATED : 16th MARCH, 2023 P.C:- The application is filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation, under Section 439(2) of Cr.P.C seeking cancellation of bail granted in favour of the respondent by the Special Judge CBI on 2/08/2018, on the ground of wrongful exercise of power to grant bail.

The application came to be filed in the year 2018 and when listed before me in the year 2023, my attention is invited to an order passed by the learned Single Judge (Justice. A.S. Gadkari) of this Court on 8/07/2022 in Criminal Application No. 669 of 2018, a similar application filed by CBI seeking cancellation of bail of one of the accused in CBI Special Case No. 37 of 2018.

2/3 25 APPLN 673-2018..doc After recording the finding, that the trial court has passed a reasoned order to the effect that there is no direct material indicating that the applicant was directly involved in preparation of the alleged LOU's and LOC's. Apart this, the Court was also impressed by another facet of the matter, the pendency of the application for last 4 years. On taking cognizance of the fact that the CBI did not take any steps to circulate the application, it was recorded as under:

"There is another facet to the present Application. The impugned Order was passed on 4th August, 2018. Present Application under Section 439(2) impugning the said Order was filed on 3rd December 2018 and till 14th January, 2021, the Applicant-CBI did not take any steps to even circulate the present Application before any Bench. That, on 14th January, 2021 for the first time at the instance of learned Advocate for the Respondent No.1, who had also filed a Bail Application No. 1243 of 2018, present Application was circulated before the co-ordinate Bench and the same was thereafter adjourned to 28th January, 2021. The Applicant-CBI thereafter also did not take any steps to get the present Application listed before the concerned Bench and on 8th June, 2022, this Court listed old Applications pertaining to the year 2018 for hearing. It therefore indicates that, the Applicant was not seriously interested in pursuing the present Application".

I have heard Mr. Venegavkar, the learned counsel for CBI and the counsel for the respondent.

I have perused the impugned order, under which the Applicant/Respondent herein is released on bail. As far as the respondent is concerned, he was

3/3 25 APPLN 673-2018..doc arrested on 20/02/2018 and was released on bail on 16/07/2018. The respondent being arraigned as accused no.8 was working as Assistant Finance Executive with M/s Gitanjali Gems Ltd., and is alleged to be privy to the criminal conspiracy by stating that he had prepared the LOU applications/documents used by the three companies for getting the LOU's issued fraudulently.

The learned Judge, while releasing the applicant on bail has specifically recorded that there is no material to show that he has prepared any fraudulent document or has played any major role in preparing or destroying or concealing the valuable material as alleged, but he was only assisting the accused Vipul Chitaliya as and when directed by him and in absence of any material attributing conspiracy with the main master minds, he was released on bail.

I do not see any legal infirmity in the said order and, particularly, when the observations in para 8 of the order 8/07/2022 are equally applicable to the present case, as the prosecution has not bothered to move the application and it is more than 5 years that the application has been filed. It would not therefore be in the interest of justice, without any apparent illegality being attributed in the impugned order, to cancel the bail, after a period of more than 4 years. Hence the application is rejected.

( SMT. BHARATI DANGRE, J.)