HC turns down anticipatory bail plea of dismissed Punjab police officer Raj Jit

Tribune News Service

Saurabh Malik

Chandigarh, August 3

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has turned down the anticipatory bail plea filed by dismissed police officer Raj Jit Singh Hundal after observing that the allegations are serious and custodial interrogation will necessarily be required.

The high court asserted this was for finding out the manner in which the petitioner was operating, along with his subordinate officials, and subverting the system he was supposed to head in a positive manner. Hundal had moved the court seeking anticipatory bail in an FIR registered on July 12, 2012, under the provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act and the Indian Penal Code at STF police station in Mohali.

After hearing Punjab Additional Advocate-General Gaurav Garg Dhuriwala and rival contentions, Justice G.S. Sandhawalia and Justice Harpreet Kaur Jeewan asserted the Division Bench had been monitoring the proceedings for the last decade. It would be a miscarriage of justice that at the end of it, and on the investigation conducted by the senior officers, the petitioner was granted the benefit of anticipatory bail as the Bench on March 28 had given liberty to the State to take action on the reports submitted in the drugs menace case.

The Bench observed the petitioner was given several opportunities to project his stand before the senior officials, but he failed to do so. The acquiring of “expensive properties” around Chandigarh during the period he was posted at Tarn Taran—a border district and facing the largest number of matters under the NDPS Act—was serious matter of concern “for the health and safety of young generation to save them from drug menace which has already been consuming the precious time of this Court”.

The Bench added the petitioner appeared to have been indulging in the trade of drugs instead of being at the forefront to break the nexus of the smugglers and drug trade. It was on this account that his role was seriously required to be investigated as apparently he had been “running with hare and hunting with the hounds”.

The Bench added the investigation, as such, could not be curtailed while granting interim protection to the petitioner, who was a well seasoned “customer”. Granting any such benefit would lead to curtailing the right of the investigating officers to get to the bottom of the sordid story of drug trafficking, whereby involvement of the police officials in pushing innocent persons into false cases had been uncovered.

“While discussing the contents of the challan, we had already noticed the heavy commercial recoveries in which there have been acquittals recorded and therefore the proverb of ‘the fence eating the crop comes to mind’”.

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