New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday set aside the Kerala High
Court order which cancelled the bail of a man belonging to a right wing
organisation in an attempt-to-murder case.
A
vacation bench of Justices Navin Sinha and Ajay Rastogi said that two other
cases on the basis of which bail of Ratheesh alias Kara Ratheesh was cancelled
are in related a protest and stopping the shooting of a film outside a temple.
We
are unable to sustain the order of the High Court, the bench said, while noting
that Ratheesh was on bail for nearly three years before his relief was cancelled
by the high court for violation of bail conditions.
At
the outset, senior advocate R Basant, appearing for Ratheesh, said the
petitioner is head of All India Hindu Parishad and he was booked in the two
cases which related to protests in which many other people were also involved.
The
bench noted the submission of the state government that a charge sheet has been
filed in one case and Ratheesh has breached one of the bail conditions by
getting involved in two other cases.
Earlier,
the top court had directed Ratheesh to surrender before the police and sought
Kerala government’s response on the plea challenging the high court order of
March 18 cancelling his bail.
The
high court had cancelled the bail granted to the petitioner for failing to
adhere to the conditions of grant of bail given on March 21, 2018.
The
high court had on March 21, 2018 suspended the execution of his sentence in the
attempt-to-murder case with the condition that he would not get involved in any
other offence and any breach of the condition would result in cancellation of
bail.
Later
the Kerala government had moved the High Court saying that Ratheesh has been
involved in two cases registered at Perumbavoor Police Station and at Kalady
Police Station and hence his bail needs to be cancelled.
Ratheesh has contended that there had not been any case where
he can be said to have consciously and individually committed any crime, so as
to forfeit the indulgence granted by the Court.
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