NEW DELHI: In a reprieve for lakhs of undertrials in Uttar Pradesh, the state government on Monday informed the Supreme Court that a Bill to restore the legal provision for anticipatory bail, taken away in 1975 during the Emergency, would be placed before the Assembly. Additional Advocate General Aishwarya Bhati told a bench of Justices SA Bobde and LN Rao about the proposal to reintroduce the anticipatory bail provision in the state.
At present, UP and Uttarakhand are the only states that do not have the remedy of pre-arrest bail. So, in most criminal cases, the accused are first arrested and then they have to seek either regular bail or quashing of charges before the high court, thereby overcrowding jails.During the Emergency, the UP government had amended the CrPC in 1976 and withdrawn the provision of anticipatory bail in the state.
The counsel for the Uttarakhand government sought a week’s time to come back with instructions on the issue.In 2010, the Mayawati government had passed a law providing for anticipatory bail, but the then President, while seeking some clarifications, had sent it back to the Governor in September 2011. Since then, the UP government has not got the amended proposal passed in the Assembly.