Madurai bench of the Madrs High Court today made it clear that no provision in Criminal Procedure Code contemplates cash deposit as a condition precedent for grant of bail.
Justice S Vaidyanathan, allowing petitions filed by 10 accused, who were granted anticipatory bail by the District and Principal Sessions Judge, Tanjavur, challenging a condition to deposit Rs 15,000 each while setting aside the condition, in his order said "the practice of imposing condition for depositing money for granting bail has been deprecated by High Courts and Supreme Court"
"Of course the court of law while granting bail is entitled to put certain conditions as its discretion. However it should not be ignored that such conditions must be reasonable and judicious and should not be arbitrary."
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"In fact no provision in code of criminal procedure contemplates cash deposit as a condition precedent for grant of bail, but may permit the person to deposit some money in lieu of executing bond and giving surety of one or two persons.", the judge said.
While graning anticipatory bail to the accused in a case the District and Sessions Judge, Tanjavur imposed a condition to the accused including to deposit Rs 15,000 each before the Magistrate at Kumbakonam.
This was challenged by the accused.
The counsel for the accused submitted that the accused are agricultural workers and they find difficulty even to eke out their day to day lively-hood and hence they are unable to comply with the above condition.
The counsel submitted that neither statutory provision nor any judicial pronouncement empower the judge to impose such condition for depositing money upon a person while granting bail.
