CHENNAI: Finding lapses in remanding a person booked under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) by converting a prisoner in transit (PT) warrant into a regular warrant, a division bench of the Madras High Court granted bail to a Muslim youth who was an accused in a case relating to trafficking counterfeit currency and plotting attacks on the US Consulate in Chennai, Israel Consulate in Bengaluru, and vital installations and places of public congregation in southern India.
"The law is well settled that in case where the accused is on bail in non-bailable offence and did not appear on hearing date and non-bailable warrant is issued, on appearance of the accused or on his production by police through PT warrant, opportunity should be given to the accused to explain his non-appearance and decide as to whether to let him off by recalling the warrant or to cancel the bail by recording reasons. And he cannot be straightway remanded to judicial custody as a PT warrant can never be converted into a regular warrant in a case where the accused person is already on bail (sic)," said a bench of justices S Vaidyanathan and AD Jagadish Chandira while granting bail to Noorudeen aka Rafi aka Ismail.
The judges noted that in this case, the appellant has been implicated based on the confession statements and no recovery has been made from him. Given the circumstances, the court opined that the continued detention of the appellant was in violation of his right of personal liberty and the appellant was entitled to grant of bail subject to imposition of certain stringent conditions.
Allowing the criminal appeal filed by Noorudeen, the bench struck down the order of the Special Court under the National Investigation Agency Act (Sessions Court for Exclusive Trial of Bomb Blast Cases), Poonamallee.Imposing stringent bail conditions, the judge ordered the Special Court to proceed with the trial on a day-to-day basis and the trial should not be adjourned beyond seven working days at any point.
Noorudeen was arrested along with the other accused by the Q Branch of Tamil Nadu police after he was booked a case in April, 2014, under various sections of the IPC and UAPA and was released on statutory bail in 2015. After that, he did not appear before the court. The NIA took over the case.He was, however, arrested by the Periamet police in Chennai in 2021 in another case and was produced before the special court, which remanded him. Later, his bail plea was rejected.