Teesta Setalvad Case | 'What Investigation Done In 24 Hours? What Was State Doing For 20 Yrs?' : Questions By Supreme Court To Gujarat Police

In a significant development, not only was social activist Teesta Setalvad’s bail application allowed by the Supreme Court on Wednesday, but a three-judge bench of Justices BR Gavai, AS Bopanna, and Dipankar Datta also asked a number of incisive and critical questions during the hearing. Here is a compilation of certain pressing questions posed by the top court during the hearing that ultimately led to the quashing of a Gujarat High Court order denying the activist bail. How can we ignore one part of order which is self-contradictory, and only consider another? Right at the outset, Justice Gavai flagged that the order of the Gujarat High Court was ‘contradictory’ because the High Court, on the one hand, said that it cannot consider the question of whether a prima facie case at the stage of bail, but at the same time, it elaborately discussed the chargesheet evidence to “almost holds [Setalvad] guilty. “There is self-contradiction in this order,” the judge said. “The witness statements point towards the existence of an offence under Section 194 of the Indian Penal Code, and the judge has considered that,” Additional Solicitor-General SV Raju replied. Justice Gavai exclaimed, “How can the learned judge consider the statements after saying that he will not consider them?” “He has said that,” the law officer replied, “But let us ignore it for the time being.” “How can we ignore one part of the order and consider only another part? Then we will have to ignore the entire order,” Justice Gavai shot back. In the order, the apex court pronounced: “On one hand, the learned judge has spent pages to observe how it was unnecessary – rather not permissible – at the stage of granting bail, to consider whether a prima facie case has been made out. On the other hand, the judge observes that a prima facie case under Section 194 of the Indian Penal Code is made out. The findings are totally contradictory, to say the least.” How can non-initiation of proceedings to quash FIR be basis for prima facie guilt? The Supreme Court was bemused to note the High Court's approach in holding that the offences should be presumed to be admitted since the petitioner did not file any petition to quash the chargesheet. Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Teesta, vehemently questioned the High Court's reasoning, saying, “What law is this? What logic is this? She is deemed to have admitted because she did not seek to quash the FIR under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure?” Deprecating this reasoning, the top court pronounced: “Our limited understanding of law [tells us] that the factors that should be considered at the stage of the grant of bail are prima facie case, the possibility of the accused tampering with evidence or influencing witnesses, and fleeing away from the ends of justice. Other considerations include the gravity and seriousness of the offence. If the observations of the judge are to be accepted, then no bail application at the pre-trial stage could be entertained unless the accused has filed an application for quashing the proceedings under Section 482 CrPC or moved the high court or the Supreme Court under Articles 226 and 32. To say the least, the findings are totally perverse.” Was Teesta Setalvad heard before the Supreme Court made observations relating to her role in earlier judgement? The bench also seemed critical of the adverse observations made by the Supreme Court in the Zakia Jafri case against Teesta, which formed the foundation for the Gujarat police FIR.Principle of natural justice is a fundamental tenet of rule of law, said Justice Gavai, after noting that Teesta Setalvad was not heard in the Zakia Jafri case, after the State of Gujarat objected to her locus standi.“A party seeks to intervene, but her application is rejected accepting the opposition by the State. Then the court goes to make those observations! However, we are not going into that aspect because we are not sitting in appeal over the judgement."However, the bench refrained from making any observations against the Zakia Jafri judgment remarks in the order. “Though Mr Sibal has questioned the applicability of the observations in this(Zakia Jafri) judgement, judicial propriety would not permit us to delve into those issues", the bench stated in the order. ‘What was the State doing between for twenty years and how was the arrest made a single day after FIR was lodged?” ASG SV Raju alleged that Teesta attempted to fabricate evidence to implicate innocent persons in riots cases which were punishable with even death. “What were you doing between 2002 and 2022?” Justice Gavai asked. “The matter was pending. The trials were pending. We did not want to precipitate,” the law office responded. He also told the bench that the discrepancies noted by the Supreme Court-constituted special investigation team (SIT), which was the basis of the FIR, were...

Teesta Setalvad Case | 'What Investigation Done In 24 Hours? What Was State Doing For 20 Yrs?' : Questions By Supreme Court To Gujarat Police

Awstika Das

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