‘Bail, not jail’ norm can’t be applied in financial scams: SC | India News
New Delhi: In view of the spread of financial scams through Ponzi schemes, the Supreme Court ruled that defrauding people of their hard-earned money falls under the category of heinous crime and accused of such crimes cannot claim the benefit of the liberty-leaning principle of ‘bail is the rule and jail is the exception’. A bench of Justices Sanjay Kumar and K Vinod Chandran set aside an Allahabad High Court order that had granted bail to the main accused in a cheating-cum-forgery case – who had been absconding for a long time – on the grounds that his co-accused had been granted bail and it was a cheating case triable by a magistrate, invalidating it. “We can observe that the value of life and liberty of the members of the society is not limited to their ‘individual’, but also extends to their quality of life, including their economic well-being,” Justice Kumar said.Justice Kumar wrote the judgment in the financial fraud case which raised the bail limit for economic offenders at par with those accused of heinous crimes. “In crimes of a financial nature, where innocent people are cheated out of their hard-earned money by conmen, who exploit it in their life pursuits and prey on others, the aforesaid factors must be weighed while dealing with the pleas of accused criminals for grant of bail,” he said.Referring to the accused’s activity of forging names and identity cards and his intention to deceive and defraud people, the bench said it proved that he was a career criminal and a menace to the society. It allowed the appeal of the complainant and set aside the order of the High Court granting bail to the accused.
