Widow Seeks Cancellation Of Bail Granted To Her Mother Accused In 'Honour' Killing Case; Supreme Court Issues Notice

A Bench comprising CJI NV Ramana, Justice Surya Kant and Justice Aniruddha Bose issued notice after hearing submissions made by Senior Advocate Indira Jaising appearing for the petitioner widow.

During the hearing, Senior Advocate Indira Jaising submitted that the situation is tragic as the case is on verge of collapse. She added that there has been a domino effect, where all three accused including petitioner's brother, mother and now father have been granted bail, and all orders have been passed by the same Judge.

"Consider about the father, leave the mother, already for 4 years she's in jail." CJI said.

Senior Counsel Jaising responded saying that it is a woman headed household. She added that knowing that there is a woman on the other side, she herself would not have argued the application if she was not convinced that there is a determination to kill the petitioner and her life is in danger.

"That is why we cancelled bail of the brother, we will consider the father also." CJI said. Few weeks back, the Supreme Court had cancelled the bail granted to the petitioner's brother in the case.

Senior Counsel Jaising informed the Court there is a conspiracy charge involved, there was both intent and conspiracy and the mother was present at the crime scene when the sharpshooter fired at the petitioner's husband.

The present plea has been filed by a 29-year-old woman who is the wife of the deceased, challenging the order dated 09.07.2021 passed by the Rajasthan High Court granting bail to one of the accused who is also her mother, arguing that the bail was granted without appreciating the critical facts and circumstances pointing to his "involvement in the brutal murder of her husband in an honour killing incident on 17.05.2017".

The petitioner has stated that the top Court had recently, on July 12th, cancelled the bail of another accused, her brother Mukesh Chaudhary, on the ground that there is no change in circumstance and further directed the Trial Court to conclude the trial and dispose of the case as expeditiously as possible but in any event not later than one year.

A Bench headed by CJI was informed that the accused mother of the petitioner was granted bail, while it was hearing the plea for cancellation of petitioner's accused bother on July 9th.

Details of the Petition

According to the plea filed through Advocate Nupur Kumar, the Petitioner was 6 months pregnant when her husband Amit was shot point blank in broad daylight in front of her and the entire plot of killing him was hatched by the parents and her brother herein along with other co- conspirators.

It's been stated that the mother of the Petitioner and her father had previously pressurized her to abort her child forcefully against her wish in the year 2016, in order to get her married off again to someone else from within their own caste and community. Further, the mother had been giving life threats to Petitioner and her son as the marriage of the Petitioner outside her caste.

The petitioner has argued that her mother's bail plea has earlier been denied on two occasions by the High Court. The first bail application was denied in 2017 citing specific allegations and second bail application was dismissed in 2020 as no ground was made to grant bail and the first bail application was dismissed on merits.

Further, the petitioner has averred that the only grounds considered by the High Court in granting bail are that the completion of trial was taking time and that the bail application of co-accused Mukesh Choudhary (brother of the Petitioner) was granted bail on 01.12.2020 by the High Court. However, even his bail has now been cancelled by the top court on 12th July 2021.

Cancellation Of Bail Of Accused Brother

On an earlier occasion of hearing of the petitioner's plea for cancellation of her brother's plea, Senior Advocate Indira Jaising had called the case "a blatant case of honour killing" of husband of a woman who married against her family's wishes in an inter-caste marriage.

The Senior Counsel had further submitted before the court that,

"They were making attempts to dissuade her from marrying the man long before she thought of marrying him. Mother and father entered her house with sharpshooter, which shot at the husband at point-blank. It was only the neighbours that protected this girl. Otherwise plan was to kidnap her"

"What has been alleged is a criminal conspiracy between the parents and son to kill son in law. Earlier bail was cancelled by SC saying that it's not an ordinary case, it's a case of honour killing. This is a very important social issue", Jaising said.

At this juncture, CJI Ramana while addressing Senior Advocate BK Shukla appearing for the accused had stated that "What are these orders? Why can't they wait? The anxiety of your client, before trial he wants to come out of jail, that's not correct. Previously we had cancelled. They should have waited for the trial to be completed."

"She has been granted bail. Now. While we were present in Court today." Jaising said.

Advocate HD Thanvi appearing for State of Rajasthan had also submitted that the Bail granted to the accused should be cancelled as reasons have been given by High Court.

" The problem is all these accused will come out before Trial. Today mother got it, Tomorrow Father will come out." CJI had said.

(Case Title: Mamta Nair vs State of Rajasthan and others)

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