Winning polls not a criteria to get bail: HC
The AP High Court on Wednesday refused bail to Kadapa MP Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy in the illegal investments case and said that wining 15 Assembly seats and a Lok Sabha seat was an irrelevant factor in a criminal case and could not be the ground for granting or rejecting bail.
Dismissing the bail application, Justice Samudrala Govindarajulu said that the individual right of a petitioner for bail could not be given precedence over the larger public interest when there were allegations against the accused of causing wrongful loss by way of deprivation of public money which was meant for development and welfare of the people.
The CBI has alleged that Mr Reddy had amassed Rs 43,000 crore by using his late father’s official position as the CM. Agreeing with the CBI arguments, the judge said he was of the opinion that there was a likelihood of the accused tampering with evidence and influencing witnesses if released on bail. Refuting the contentions of Mr Reddy’s senior counsel Ram Jethmalani that the CBI was probing issues which were not in the FIR, the judge observed that it was a well-settled principle of law that an FIR wasn’t an encyclopaedia of a cri-minal case and it doesn’t prevent a probe into related matters.
Post new comment