The High Court has issued four directives for the subordinate courts across the country over cancellation of the bail granted by High Court to the accused and ordered the Supreme Court Registrar General to issue a circular to this effect.
In a full text of a verdict the court said that the subordinate courts across the country shall not cancel the bail of an accused granted by the High Court Division without any allegation of proven misuse of the privilege of bail by the accused.
The verdict also mentioned that when an accused is enjoying the privilege of ad-interim bail granted by the High Court for a limited period in apending rule or in an appeal against under special law and he/she is regularly appearing before the lower court, his/her bail shall not be cancelled and cannot be taken him/her into jail custody by the lower court only on the ground that he/she could not submit bail extension order from the High Court.
In the event of unavailability of such extension order, the lower courts must wait for the result of the rule or the appeal, as the case may be, in which the accused was granted ad-interim bail, added the verdict.
Judges of the subordinate courts shall not cancel bail of an accused granted by the High Court Division in pending rule or appeal until and unless the rule is discharged or the appeal is dismissed or in any way the accused violates any condition of bail, if any, imposed by the High Court at the time of granting bail, also read the verdict.
The High Court bench of Justice Habibul Gani and Justice Md Badruzzaman delivered the verdict after hearing a criminal appeal petition filed under section 28 of the Nari-O-Shishu Nirjaton Daman Ain, 2000 (as amended in 2003).
The court announced the short verdict on the appeal on October 23 last year, but the full text of the verdict has been released in the website of the Supreme Court on Thursday.
The High Court asked the registrar general of the Supreme Court to issue a “General Circular” to all the Judges/Magistrates having exercising criminal jurisdiction containing the above-mentioned directions.
The court said in a observation, “In the recent years, we have been noticing that a common practice has been developed among the judges of the courts below to the effect that in exercising criminal jurisdiction, they have been frequently cancelling the ad-interim bail of accused persons granted by the High Court and taking the accused persons into jail without any allegation of misuse.”
“It appears that subordinate court judges are usually cancelling the bail on the ground that the accused persons had not extended the period of bail from the High Court. Due to such cancellation miscellaneous cases and appeals, as the case may be, are increasing day by day in the High Court and litigant public are also suffering a lot both financially and physically,” also read the verdict.
Md Ibrahim filed the appeal petition with the High Court against an order of the Nari-O-Shishu Nirjatan Daman Tribunal no-5 of Chattogram passed on June 19, 2019, cancelling his bail and sending him to the jail though he had earlier secured ad-interim bail from the High Court in a case filed on the allegation of outraging modesty of a minor boy.
On September 7, 2018, the HC had granted ad-interim bail to Ibrahim for six months and issued a rule asking the authorities concerned to explain why he should not be granted permanent bail in the case.
But, the Nari O Shishu Nirjaton Daman Tribunal no-5 of Chattogram on June 19, 2019, cancelled the HC bail and sent Ibrahim to jail custody in the case although the HC rule was pending.
The tribunal cancelled his bail with a finding that the bail which was granted for a period of 6 months, in the meantime, has expired and as such, the accused is not entitled to continue with the bail granted by the High Court.
Then, Ibrahim filed the appeal with the HC challenging the tribunal order cancelling his bail. The High Court delivered the verdict on hearing the appeal petition.
