SC quashes order granting bail to Pappu Yadav

NEW DELHI: Refusing draw a parallel between Sankaracharya Jayendera Saraswathi and RJD MP Pappu Yadav, both accused of conspiracy and murder in different cases, the Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected Yadav''s plea for bail as it took serious view of his conduct during his incarceration.
Quashing an order of the Patna high court that allowed bail to Yadav for the eight time, a Bench of Justices N Santosh Hegde, S B Sinha and P K Balasubramanyan said "the high court was totally in error in allowing bail" to Yadav.
After pronouncing its verdict, the Bench adjourned till February 1 the hearing on CBI''s plea for shifting Yadav from Beur Jail at Patna to a prison outside Bihar.
Sharan narrated the sequence of events and the antics of Yadav both inside the jail and outside which necessitated his transfer to one of the six jails outside Bihar.
But Jain referred to a Supreme Court judgment which had barred even hardened convicted criminals from being shifted to a distant prison as it would affect his meeting his near relatives.
Yadav was arrested about six years ago for hatching conspiracy to eliminate his political rival and CPM legislator Ajit Sarkar on June 14,1998. A noted trade union activist Sarkar was gunned with prohibited AK-47 and automatic weapons allegedly used by Yadav''s men.
While allowing the appeals filed by Ajit Sarkar''s brother Kalyan Sarkar and CBI, the Bench held that the prosecution has established a "prima facie case against the accused".
It also noted that many witnesses in the case were yet to be examined, the Bench said "the conduct of the accused clearly indicates that enlarging him on bail impede the progress of the trial."
Yadav''s counsel R K Jain had argued that the accused''s case was on a better footing than the case against Kanchi seer Jayendera Saraswathi, who was granted bail by the apex court on January 11.
Jain had also argued that the Bench headed by Chief Justice R C Lahoti which granted bail to Sankaracharya ought to have overruled the March 2004 judgment by which Yadav had been denied the bail.
Disagreeing with him, the Bench said in the seer''s case the court had distinguished the facts from the facts in Yadav case. Sankaracharya was granted bail on the basis of facts in his case therefore the question of earlier Yadav case judgment being overruled in another case "does not arise".
"While deciding the cases on facts, more so in criminal cases the court should bear in mind each case must rest on its own facts and the similarity of facts in one case cannot be used to bear in mind the conclusion of fact in another case", the Bench explained.
CBI''s counsel and additional solicitor general Amarendera Sharan had argued that despite the apex court finding that there was a prima facie case against the accused, the high court continued to grant him bail.
Vijay Hansaria, counsel for victim''s brother Kalyan Chandra, had said that testimony of 44 more witnesses were yet to be recorded in the case. "The past conduct of the accused very clearly shows that if he is released on bail he would certainly threaten the witnesses and temper with the evidence", counsel said, adding a number of witnesses had already turned hostile during the period Yadav was let out on bail.
The Bench also expressed anguish over lack of discipline in judiciary and viewed with concern the Patna HC orders which ignored its findings in granting bail to Yadav.