On March 15, the Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh High Court rejected a BSF Officer’s bail application. The petitioner is the prime accused in the J&K Service Selection Board Sub-Inspector recruitment scam case.
Justice Sanjay Dhar observed, “A person, who indulges in facilitating leakage and sale of question papers relating to competitive examinations, plays with the career and future of thousands of young aspirants. Such an act is more heinous than an offence of murder because by killing a person only one family gets affected but by ruining the career of thousands of aspirants, whole society is adversely impacted,” while rejecting the petitioner’s bail application.
The petitioner submitted that the CBI had wrongly implicated him in the recruitment scam case. He submitted that he is a Doctor and a CMO/Commandant Medical in the BSF with an unblemished service career record.
Furthermore, he submitted that the investigation is complete and the chargesheet is filed before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, and no material in the chargesheet connects the petitioner to alleged conspiracy, urging him to be released on bail.
Furthermore, he submitted that his wife has bone marrow cancer, a life-consuming disease, and hence needs constant care and attention from him. Moreover, he submitted that he suffers from psychiatric problems and that his health is deteriorating daily.
However, the Court observed, “It is true that the charge sheet has already been laid before the learned Magistrate, but in the charge sheet, it is clearly mentioned that further investigation to unearth larger conspiracy, to trace proceeds of crime, to establish role of other accused persons and to probe other allegations levelled in the FIR is underway,” and rejected the petitioner’s submissions that the investigation is complete.
The Court said, “There can be no doubt about the fact that the petitioner is stated to be involved in offences which do not carry punishment of imprisonment of more than seven years, but the nature of accusations against the petitioner makes the crime alleged to have been committed by him extremely heinous. The severity of punishment that the charge may entail may be one of the considerations for grant of bail, but then nature and seriousness of allegations against a person seeking bail is also of vital importance.”
“A person, who indulges in facilitating leakage and sale of question papers relating to competitive examinations, plays with the career and future of thousands of young aspirants. Such an act is more heinous than an offence of murder because by killing a person, only one family gets affected but by ruining the career of thousands of aspirants, whole society is adversely impacted. Therefore, the charges levelled against the petitioner can by no stretch of imagination be termed as ordinary charges,” the Court added.
The Court observed, “It has been submitted by the respondent that another FIR relating to question paper leakage of Finance Accounts Assistant examination conducted by the J&K SSB has been registered in which role of the petitioner has surfaced.”
Furthermore, the Court said, “Even the report of the Enquiry Committee set up by the Government is damning against the petitioner. In the said report, it has been noted that the petitioner had managed to induct several candidates in the BSF against financial consideration and that he had advertised secretly that he would help prospective candidates in passing the medical tests.”
“The report further records that the petitioner has close links with some high and mighty politicians. In the face of the propensity of the petitioner to indulge in similar types of offences, it may not be appropriate to enlarge him on bail at this stage when the investigation relating to the larger conspiracy of question paper leakage of Sub Inspector posts is still underway,” the Court added.
While the Court rejected the petitioner’s bail application, the Court also directed the CBI to expeditiously complete further investigation and file a supplementary charge sheet, if any. The Court said, “I do not find any merit in the instant bail application. The same is dismissed. However, the respondent- Investigating Agency is directed to complete the further investigation in the case and file supplementary charge sheet, if any, expeditiously, preferably within a period of three months from today.”
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