Bombay high court rejects Maharashtra cop's pre-arrest bail plea in suicide case

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court rejected the pre-arrest bail plea of a constable, attached to Ulhasnagar police in neighbouring Thane district, accused of abetting the suicide of a 19-year-old youth. A vacation bench of Justice Sarang Kotwal was Thursday hearing an application filed by police constable Pawan Kedar seeking anticipatory bail in the case lodged against him by the Ulhasnagar police on May 3 under section 306 (abetment to suicide) of IPC.
According to the police, the victim, who used to run a juice and sandwich stall in Ulhasnagar, committed suicide on May 5 after being allegedly harassed by the accused.
Kedar allegedly demanded Rs 10,000 from the victim each month and free food, failing which he threatened to book the victim under false cases.
When the victim refused to pay the money, the accused on May 2 took the victim to the police station and allegedly said he was going to be booked in a case. The victim after returning home committed suicide.
His brother then lodged a case against Kedar for causing harassment amounting to abetment to commit suicide.
"Considering all the material available with the police, at this stage it is clear that because of the harassment caused by the present applicant (Kedar), the deceased had to take the extreme step of suicide," the court said.
In view of these circumstances, no case for anticipatory bail is made out, it added.
Kedar's advocate M K Kocharekar told the court that the accused was only doing his duty diligently and had taken legitimate action against the deceased for which he cannot be termed as an offender.
Additional public prosecutor V B Konde-Deshmukh, however, opposed the plea and argued that under the guise of performance of duty, the accused was demanding extortion money from the deceased and was continuously harassing him which has resulted in the deceased committing suicide.
The court, in its order, noted that there were several statements of the deceased's friends which point out to the harassment meted to him by the accused person.
"There are statements of employees of the deceased which refer to the grievance made by the deceased to them. Such grievance may amount to his oral dying declaration," the court said.