Supreme Court upholds bail granted to Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira in drug case

The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to cancel the bail granted by the Punjab and Haryana High Court to Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira in a 2015 drugs case [State of Punjab vs Sukhpal Singh Khaira]..A bench of Justices Bela M Trivedi and KV Viswanathan rejected the appeal filed by the State of Punjab against the High Court order."Order is only on power of investigating agency. Now we are in 2024, FIR in 2015. Is what cannot be done directly being done indirectly via 319. In this background High Court has passed its order...File appropriate applications before the High Court," the top court said.Senior Advocate Sidharth Luthra appeared for the State government..The High Court had on January 4 granted relief to Khaira in a case under the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.Single-judge Justice Anoop Chitkara had recorded a prima facie satisfaction that the Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) was not guilty of the allegations.Khaira was earlier a leader of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) before he was suspended from the party in 2018 after which he resigned from AAP.He then joined the Congress party. Khaira was arrested on September 28, 2023. He argued before the High Court that he had been arrested only because he had parted ways with AAP..During the hearing today, the top court inquired as to why there was a chargesheet against Khaira in the first instance. "The entire case was concluded and at fag end you are seeking to implead him? Till trial was over there were no litany of charges," the Court asked.Counsel for the State pointed out that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) had also intervened and arrested him. "ED also stepped in, filed complaint and charges have been framed...and he was also arrested by them.""Since no case made out in predicate offence so this does not arise," said Senior Advocate PS Patwalia appearing for Khaira..In the case dating back to 2015, the State government had moved an application in 2017 under Section 319 of Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) to summon Khaira as an accused.The application was allowed, and the decision of the trial court was later upheld by the Punjab and Haryana High Court . The Supreme Court had in February 2023 set aside the trial court order, taking note of the fact that a Constitution Bench in 2022 held that once the trial judge passes an order of sentence, it does not have the power to pass an order under Section 319 CrPC.Though the trial court in April dropped the proceedings against Khaira on the basis of the top court’s ruling, it permitted the investigating agency to continue with the probe to enable them to file a chargesheet under Section 173 CrPC. Consequently, the Director of Bureau of Investigation in September 2023 constituted another SIT to investigate the FIR and arraigned Khaira and others as additional accused..Punjab Advocate General Gurminder Singh also appeared for the State, along with advocates Nupur Kumar, Kushagra Raghuvanshi, Karanveer Gogia, and Ambuj Tiwari.Senior Advocate Vikram Chaudhri with advocates Nikhil Jain, Rishi Sehgal, Arveen S, Nikita Gill, and Muskaan Khurana also represented Khaira.