Taking serious objection to the conduct of Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav both inside and outside the prison, the Supreme Court on Tuesday cancelled the bail granted to him by the Patna High Court in the case pertaining to the murder of trade union leader Ajit Sarkar.
With this the Supreme Court has cancelled his bail twice after he being directed to be enlarged on bail by the high court.
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A Bench comprising Justice N Santosh Hegde and Justice S B Sinha, while allowing the appeals filed by Ajit Sarkar's brother Kalyan Sarkar and the Central Bureau of Investigation, said the prosecution has established a "prima facie case against the accused".
Observing 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."
"The high court was totally in error in enlarging the accused on bail," the Bench said while rejecting the argument of Yadav's counsel that his case was on a better footing than the case against Kanchi seer Jayendra Saraswati, who was granted bail by the apex court.
Terming the argument equating the Shankaracharya's case with the case against Yadav as an argument in "desperation", the Bench said in both the cases the apex court has not declared any law but observed certain things peculiar to the facts and circumstances of the cases which could not be applied generally to all the cases.
The court said the order granting bail to Shankaracharya was of no benefit to the accused in the Ajit Sarkar murder case and observed "each case must rest on its own facts".
Expressing anguish over lack of discipline in the judiciary, the court said when a higher court passes an order based on facts and circumstances of a particular case, the lower courts should respect that order and should not deviate from it unless a change of circumstance was pointed out in that case.
