Offence under SC/ST Act not made out: Punjab & Haryana High Court grants interim bail to Times Now journalist Bhawana Kishore

The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Saturday granted interim bail to Times Now journalist Bhawana Kishore in a case arising from an alleged rash driving incident where she was accused of insulting a Dalit woman [Bhawana Gupta v State of Punjab]..Justice Augustine George Masih went through the First Information Report (FIR) and opined that offences under the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act were not made out. "Apart from this aspect, the petitioner No.1 being a senior correspondent of National Network and a 31 years old lady deserves to be granted interim bail in the present facts and circumstances of the case", the single-judge reasoned. .The petitioners stated that they did not know the complainant and there was no assertion that they had ever met earlier. Therefore, the question of using offensive words as claimed did not arise. The court's attention was drawn to Section 8(c) of the act to contend that an accused is required to have personal knowledge of the victim or their family and only then can a presumption of the offence being committed could arise.Further, the petitioners argued that offences under the SC and ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act were attributed to them in order to make the offence non-bailable as the other offences under the Indian Penal Code are bailable. .The three petitioners, including Kishore, were stated to have been travelling to Ludhiana for an event relating to the inauguration of government-run clinics on an invitation received from the media coordinator. .The State government opposed the bail plea arguing that before the court can hear the case, the victim's family ought to be given notice. Therefore, time was sought to inform the complainant. .However, taking into account the lack of a case being made out against the petitioners, the court granted interim bail while asking the State to inform the complainant of the proceedings. The case will be heard again today. .Senior Advocates RS Rai, Chetan Mittal, along with advocates Pawan Narang, Kunal Mulwani, Gautam Dutt, Mayank Aggarwal, Udit Garg, Arjun S. Rai, Advocate, Farhad Kohli, Advocate and Sukhriti Rai appeared for the petitioners. The respondents were represented by the Advocate General Vinod Ghai along with Additional Advocates General Jasdev Mehndiratta, advocates Gaurav Dhuriwala and Ferry Sofat..[Read Order]