A wonderful pronouncement indeed, of a 5-eminent judge Constitutional bench which decided that once Anticipatory Bail is granted u/s 438 CrPC by either a Sessions Court or High Court, it does not have any time limit to it regarding it’s effect. Further, here it was held, No need to get a Regular Bail once AB is granted.

From now onwards, no need to covert Anticipatory Bail into a Regular Bail, upon closure of investigation by I.O. and filing of Charge sheet into a Trial Court.

Here is the Order passed.

And the 133-page jewel of judgment, endorsing the view taken by my favorite Justice Shri Dalveer Bhandavi in Siddharam Satlingappa Mhetre is below.

From Para 69 of the judgment of Justice Ravindra Bhat (On page 112),

69. Therefore, this court holds that the view expressed in Salauddin Abdulsamad Shaikh, K.L. Verma, Nirmal Jeet Kaur, Satpal Singh, Adri Dharan Das, HDFC Bank, J.J. Manan and Naresh Kumar Yadav (supra) about the Court of Sessions, or the High Court, being obliged to grant anticipatory bail, for a limited duration, or to await the course of investigation, so as the “normal court” not being “bye passed” or that in certain kinds of serious offences, anticipatory bail should not be granted normally- including in economic offences, etc are not good law. The observations – which indicate that such time related or investigative event related conditions, should invariably be imposed at the time of grant of anticipatory bail are therefore, overruled. Similarly, the observations in Mhetre that “the courts should not impose restrictions on the ambit and scope of section 438 Cr.P.C. which are not envisaged by the Legislature. The court cannot rewrite the provision of the statute in the garb of interpreting it” is too wide and cannot be considered good law. It is one thing to say that as a matter of law, ordinarily special conditions (not mentioned in Section 438 (2) read with Section 437 (3) should not be imposed; it is an entirely different thing to say that in particular instances, having regard to the nature of the crime, the role of the accused, or some peculiar feature, special conditions should not be imposed. The judgment in Sibbia itself is an authority that such conditions can be imposed, but not in a routine or ordinary manner and that such conditions then become an inflexible “formula” which the courts would have to follow. Therefore, courts and can, use their discretion, having regard to the offence, the peculiar facts, the role of the offender, circumstances relating to him, his likelihood of subverting justice (or a fair investigation), likelihood of evading or fleeing justice- to impose special conditions. Imposing such conditions, would have to be on a case to case basis, and upon exercise of discretion by the court seized of the application under Section 438. In conclusion, it is held that imposing conditions such as those stated in Section 437 (2) while granting bail, are normal; equally, the condition that in the event of the police making out a case of a likely discovery under Section 27 of the Evidence Act, person released on bail shall be liable to be taken in police custody for facilitating the discovery. Other conditions, which are restrictive, are not mandatory; nor is there any invariable rule that they should necessarily be imposed or that the anticipatory bail order would be for a time duration, or be valid till the filing of the FIR, or the recording of any statement under Section 161, Cr. PC, etc. Other conditions may be imposed, if the facts of the case so warrant.

Citations : [2020 SCC ONLINE SC 98], [2020 DLT SC 266 741]

Other Sources :

https://indiankanoon.org/doc/123660783/

https://www.indianemployees.com/judgments/details/sushila-aggarwal-and-others-versus-state-nct-of-delhi-and-another

https://www.indianemployees.com/judgments/details/sushila-aggarwal-and-others-versus-state-nct-of-delhi-and-another

5-judge bench holds no time limit could be fixed while granting anticipatory bail [Full report]

The life of this case is in detail available here.

Index of all Anticipatory Bail Matters is here and all Bail matters list is here.