The Supreme Court on Monday set aside a Uttarakhand High Court order granting default bail to two prime accused in the 2024 Haldwani riots case under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act [State of Uttarakhand v. Javed Siddiqui & Anr.]
A Bench consisting of Justice Vikram Nath and Justice Sandeep Mehta allowed the Uttarakhand State’s appeal and quashed the High Court’s January 8, 2025 judgment. It held that the default bails were wrongly granted on factually incorrect findings about delays in investigation.
“Having gone through the record, we find that the High Court has completely gone wrong in casting aspersions on the conduct of the Investigating Officer in failing to complete the investigation within a period of 90 days," the top court said.
The Court directed the accused, Javed Siddiqui and Arshad Ayub, to surrender before the trial court within two weeks.
The case relates to the violence in Haldwani's Banbhoolpura that broke out on February 8, 2024 during an anti-encroachment drive in which authorities demolished a madrasa and mosque said to be on government land.
The demolition subsequently triggered protests that quickly turned violent, with mobs pelting stones, setting vehicles on fire and attacking police personnel. According to the FIR, a large number of accused were involved, with allegations that the mob used petrol bombs and other weapons while inflicting damage to public property, including a police station building.
The Court backed the pace of the probe, stressing that the nature of the case required time and effort.
“Without a doubt, the investigation was proceeding with utmost expediency in a case which would have presented grave challenges to the investigation agency, considering the magnitude of the crime and the large number of accused and witnesses," it held.
The Supreme Court pointed out that the High Court’s conclusion was based on incorrect facts. While the High Court had recorded that only a few witnesses were examined, the records before the Supreme Court showed that statements of 65 witnesses had been recorded within the initial period.
Noting the High Court’s criticism that the investigation was slow and lacked progress, the Supreme Court observed that such findings were not justified.
“It was absolutely unreasonable of the High Court to have observed that the investigating agency had not proceeded with investigation at a reasonable pace or that it had acted with lethargy,” said the Court.
The Court further noted that the police had taken proper permission from the trial court to extend the time for completing the investigation, as allowed under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA). It also noted that the chargesheet in the case was filed within this extended period, thereby negating the claim for default bail.
Additionally, it found that the accused did not challenge the extension orders or the rejection of their earlier default bail plea in time and had approached the High Court only months later, by which point the investigation was already complete.
“Thus, we are of the opinion that by the time, the accused respondents approached the High Court, they had lost the right to seek default bail by their acquiescence,” held the Court.
Ultimately, the Supreme Court cancelled the default bail granted to the accused, while clarifying that they could still apply for regular bail, which will be decided on its own merits.
The State of Uttarakhand was represented by Deputy Advocate General (DAG) Jatinder Kumar Sethi along with advocates Ashutosh Kumar Sharma and Vikas Negi.
Senior Advocate Siddharth Agarwal along with advocates Ria Yadav, Vishwajeet Singh, Arya Panwar and Rahul Gupta represented the accused.