Pallav Jain v. State Of Punjab
-1IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Date of Decision: 04.05.2026 Pallav Jain ..... Petitioner
Versus
State of Punjab ..... Respondent
CORAM:
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RAJESH BHARDWAJ ***
Present:
Mr. Parunjeet Singh, Advocate for the petitioner.
Mr. K. D. Sachdeva, DAG, Punjab.
*** RAJESH BHARDWAJ, J.
1.
Present petition has been filed praying for the grant of anticipatory bail to the petitioner in case bearing FIR No.42, dated 27.02.2021, under Sections 22, 25, 29, 61, 85 of NDPS Act, 1985, registered at Police Station City-II Khanna, District Ludhiana. 2.
Succinctly, the facts of the case are that the police party was on patrolling on 27.02.2021 in front of MCD Mall, Delhi-Khanna, G.T. Road, Khanna and at about 07:40 P.M., one car mark Verna was seen coming from Mandi Gobindgarh side, which was being driven by one young man. On suspicion, the same was signalled to stop but instead of stopping the vehicle, the young man, who was driving the vehicle, got perplexed and tried to escape, however, with the help of the police
-2officials, the vehicle was stopped and the young man, who was driving the car, apprehended by the police party. On asking, he disclosed his name to be Bablu Ram. He was suspected to be carrying some contraband in the car and thus, search of the car was conducted. On the conductor seat of the car, some boxes of intoxicant tablets were kept. On conducting the search of the car, 21 boxes of intoxicant tablets were recovered, each box containing 500 tablets and thus, in total 10,500 intoxicant tablets were recovered. He failed to produce any licence regarding the conscious possession of the same, thus, the FIR was registered and he was arrested on the spot. The samples taken were sent to the FSL. On registration of the FIR, the investigation commenced.
During the investigation, complicity of the petitioner surfaced and thus, he was arrayed as an accused in the present case. Another contraband, i.e. 33,200 intoxicant tablets containing Tramadol Hydrochloride and 18,000 intoxicant tablets containing Alprazolam were recovered from the shop/godown, being run by the petitioner and the co-accused, namely, Adish Jain. Apprehending his arrest, the petitioner approached the Court of learned Judge, Special Court, Ludhiana praying for the grant of anticipatory bail. However, after hearing both the sides and finding no merit in the same, the learned Judge, Special Court, Ludhiana declined the bail application filed by the petitioner vide order dated 13.04.2026.
Hence, being aggrieved, the petitioner is before this Court by way of filing the present petition praying for the grant of anticipatory bail.
-33.
Learned counsel for the petitioner has submitted that the petitioner has been falsely and frivolously implicated in the present case. He has submitted that neither the petitioner is named in the FIR, nor any recovery has been effected from the conscious possession of the petitioner, however, he has been implicated in the present case on the basis of disclosure statement of co-accused, which in itself is not even an admissible evidence. He has further submitted that the petitioner has been roped in the present case because the rent agreement for the said shop/godown, being run by the petitioner along with the co-accused, namely, Adish Kumar, from which the contraband, i.e. 33200 intoxicant tablets containing Tramadol Hydrochloride and 18000 intoxicant tablets containing Alprazolam were recovered, was in the name of the petitioner.
He has submitted that the co-accused, namely, Adish Jain, who is the main accused, has already been granted the concession of interim bail by this Court vide order dated 21.02.2022 passed in CRM-M-14570-2021, which was subsequently made it absolute. He has submitted that no prima facie case as alleged is made out against the petitioner and thus, she deserves to be granted anticipatory bail. 4.
Learned counsel for the State, however, has opposed the submissions made by learned counsel for the petitioner. He has submitted that complicity of the petitioner has been prima facie established during the investigation. He has further submitted that the contraband, i.e. 33200 intoxicant tablets containing Tramdaol and 18000 intoxicant tablets containing Alprazolam were allegedly recovered from the shop/godown,
-4being run by the petitioner along with the co-accused, namely, Adish Kumar. He has submitted that the petitioner along with the co-accused, namely, Adish Kumar had taken the shop on rent and doing the illegal business of selling intoxicant tablets. He has submitted that the contraband recovered in the present case falls under the category of commercial quantity and thus, the provisions of Section 37 of NDPS Act are attracted. He has further submitted that the recovery in the present case has been effected on due compliance of the provisions of NDPS Act. He has thus submitted that the investigation is at the initial stage and keeping in view the facts and circumstances of the case, the petitioner does not deserve the concession of anticipatory bail and the present petition deserves to be dismissed.
5.
The Court has heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the record with their able assistance. 6.
It has been transpired that FIR in the present case has been registered on the basis of secret information and on the basis of the same, contraband, i.e. 10500 intoxicant tablets containing Tramadol have been recovered from the co-accused, namely, Bablu Ram. Complicity of the petitioner has been prima facie established during the investigation on the basis of disclosure statement of co-accused. Another contraband, i.e. 33200 intoxicant tablets containing Tramadol and 18000 intoxicant tablets containing Alprazolam was allegedly recovered from the shop/godown, being run by the petitioner along with the co-accused, namely, Adish Kumar. As submitted before this Court by learned counsel
-5for the State that the recovery in the present case was effected on due compliance of provisions of NDPS Act. The allegations against the petitioner are that he along with the co-accused, namely, Adish Kumar had taken the shop on rent and running the illegal business of selling intoxicant tablets. It is apparent that the total contraband recovered in the present case falls under the category of commercial quantity. Needless to say that the investigation is at threshold. The allegations against the petitioner are serious in nature.
7.
For the consideration of anticipatory bail, the statutory parameters are given under Section 482 (1) & (2) BNSS which reads as under:- "Direction for grant of bail to person apprehending arrest: 1.
When any person has reason to believe that he may be arrested on an accusation of having committed a non-bailable offence, he may apply to the High Court or the Court of Session for a direction under this section; and that Court may, if it thinks fit, direct that in the event of such arrest, he shall be released on bail. 2.
When the High Court or the Court of Session makes a direction under sub-section (1), it may include such conditions in such directions in the light of the facts of the particular case, as it may think fit, including- (i) a condition that the person shall make himself available for interrogation by a police officer as and when required; (ii) a condition that the person shall not, directly or indirectly, make any inducement, threat or promise to any person acquainted with the facts of the case so as to dissuade him from disclosing such facts to the Court or to any police officer;
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!
"# 8.
As per the law settled by the Hon'ble Supreme Court, in Gurbaksh Singh Sibbia Vs. State of Punjab, AIR 1980 SC 1632, while granting anticipatory bail, the Court is to maintain a balance between the individual liberty and the interest of society. However, the interest of the society would always prevail upon the right of personal liberty. The relevant part of the judgment is as follows:- "31.
In regard to anticipatory bail, if the proposed accusation appears to stem not from motives of furthering the ends of justice but from some ulterior motive, the object being to injure and humiliate the applicant by having him arrested, a direction for the release of the applicant on bail in the event of his arrest would generally be made. On the other hand, if it appears likely, considering the antecedents of the applicant, that taking advantage of the order of anticipatory bail he will flee from justice, such an order would not be made. But the converse of these propositions is not necessarily true.
That is to say, it cannot be laid down as an inexorable rule that anticipatory bail cannot be granted unless the proposed accusation appears to be actuated by mala fides; and, equally, that anticipatory bail must be granted if there is no fear that the applicant will abscond. There are several other considerations, too numerous to enumerate, the combined effect of which must weigh with the court while granting or rejecting anticipatory bail.
-7the applicant's presence not being secured at the trial, a reasonable apprehension that witnesses will be tampered with and "the larger interests of the public or the state" are some of the considerations which the court has to keep in mind while deciding an application for anticipatory bail. The relevance of these considerations was pointed out in State v. Captain Jagjit Singh (1962) 3 SCR 622, which, though, was a case under the old Section 498 which corresponds to the present Section 439 of the Code. It is of paramount consideration to remember that the freedom of the individual is as necessary for the survival of the society as it is for the egoistic purposes of the individual. A person seeking anticipatory bail is still a free man entitled to the presumption of innocence. He is willing to submit to restraints on his freedom, by the acceptance of conditions which the court may think fit to impose, in consideration of the assurance that if arrested, he shall be enlarged on bail."
9.
The Hon'ble Supreme Court in State Vs. Anil Sharma, (1997) 7SCC 187, held as under:- "6.
We find force in the submission of the CBI that custodial interrogation is qualitatively more elicitation oriented than questioning a suspect who is well ensconced with a favorable order under Section 438 of the Code. In a case like this effective interrogation of a suspected person is of tremendous advantage in disinterring many useful informations and also materials which would have been concealed. Success in such interrogation would elude if the suspected person knows that he is well protected and insulated by a pre-arrest bail order during the time he is
-8interrogated. Very often interrogation in such a condition would reduce to a mere ritual. The argument that the custodial interrogation is fraught with the danger of the person being subjected to third-degree methods need not be countenanced, for, such an argument can be advanced by all accused in all criminal cases. The Court has to presume that responsible police officers would conduct themselves in a responsible manner and that those entrusted with the task of disinterring offences would not conduct themselves as offenders."
10.
The petitioner has approached this Court praying for grant of anticipatory bail, however, Hon'ble the Supreme Court in 'the State of Haryana vs. Samarth Kumar', 2022 Livelaw (SC) 622 has held that in the cases like the present one, the accused may take advantage of facts like no recovery was effected from him and that he was implicated on the basis of disclosure statement made by the main accused, at the time of arguing regular bail application or at the time of final hearing after conclusion of trial.
11.
Hon'ble Supreme Court in State by the Inspector of Police vs. B. Ramu, 2024(1) Law Herald (SC) has held as under:-
11. 'In case of recovery of such a huge quantity of narcotic substance, the Courts should be slow in granting even regular bail to the accused what to talk of anticipatory bail more so when the accused is alleged to be having criminal antecedents'.
12.
Weighing the facts of the case on the anvil of the law settled, it is apparent that the complicity of the petitioner has been prima facie
-9found during the investigation on the basis of disclosure statement of coaccused. Needless to say, the investigation is at threshold and in the facts and circumstances, custodial interrogation of the petitioner would be essential and granting anticipatory bail to the petitioner at this stage would scuttle the ongoing investigation.
13.
In view of the overall facts and circumstances of the case, the petitioner does not qualify for the grant of anticipatory bail and the same is hereby dismissed. Nothing said herein shall be treated as an expression of opinion on the merits of the case. (RAJESH BHARDWAJ) JUDGE 04.05.2026 rittu Whether speaking/reasoned :
Yes/No Whether reportable :
Yes/No