Supreme Court reiterates directives on grant of bail

The Supreme Court has held that offence punishable under Section 322 (manslaughter) did not fall within Section 497(1) of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC), which prohibits the grant of bail to the accused if involved in offences punishable with death or imprisonment of ten years or over.

"Section 322, PPC falls outside the prohibitory clause of Section 497(1), CrPC1 while section 319, PPC is available," says a two-page judgment authored by Justice Syed Mansoor Ali while granting post-arrest bail to a member of the Eagle Squad (a law enforcement agency).

The accusation in the crime report against the petitioner, a member of the law enforcement agency, briefly stated that four members of the agency, including the petitioner, signalled the car of the complainant to stop but he continued to drive on, whereupon the petitioner fired at the car, which ended up in causing injuries to the complainant and death of his cousin, Faizan, who was also seated in the car.

A division bench of the apex court led by Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah said that the petitioner and other members of the Eagle Squad were on their routine duty of maintaining law and order in the city, at the time of the incident.

"There is nothing on record to show that there was a background of any enmity between the parties, or the incident was the result of some provocation or the petitioner fired at the car that had tainted glasses, with the intention to cause the death of the complainant and his cousin.

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The order said that the detention of the petitioner pending trial can only be justified if this case falls within the scope of any of the exceptions stated in the cases of Tariq Bashir, Muhammad Tanveer and Zafar Iqbal.

"There is, however, nothing on record that may attract any of the said exceptions and justify denial of post-arrest bail to the petitioner", the order reads.

The court noted that the Balochistan High Court has not exercised its discretion judiciously in denying the relief of post-arrest bail to the petitioner.

"This petition is, therefore, converted into appeal and allowed: the impugned order is set aside and the bail application of the petitioner is accepted. The petitioner is admitted to bail subject to his furnishing the bail bond in the sum of Rs.100,000/- with one surety each in the like amount to the satisfaction of the Trial Court, says the order.

However, the court clarified that the observations made in this order are of tentative nature which shall not in any manner influence the trial court, and that this concession of bail may be cancelled under Section 497(5) CrPC, if the petitioner misuses it in any manner, including causing a delay in the expeditious conclusion of the trial.