ISRO conspiracy case: Supreme Court sets aside anticipatory bail to 4 accused; directs Kerala High Court to decide matter afresh

The Supreme Court on Friday set aside the anticipatory bail granted by Kerala High Court to former police/ Intelligence Bureau officers RB Sreekumar, PS Jayaprakash, Thampi S Durga Dutt and Vijayan in connection with the conspiracy to frame former Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) scientist Nambi Narayanan in espionage case [Central Bureau of Investigation vs PS Jayaprakash]..A bench of Justices MR Shah and CT Ravikumar sent the matter back to the Kerala High Court to decide the pleas afresh.The order was passed on a plea by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against a Kerala High Court order, which had granted relief to the accused." ... the impugned judgment(s) and order(s) passed by the High Court granting anticipatory bail to the respondents – original accused deserve to be quashed and set aside and the matters are to be remitted to the High Court to consider the anticipatory bail applications afresh and thereafter to pass appropriate orders in accordance with law and on their own merits. We request the High Court to finally decide and disposed of the anticipatory bail applications ... within a period of four weeks", the apex court ordered.The Court also directed that the accused shall not be arrested for a period of five weeks from today subject to their cooperation with the probe. The High Court while deciding the plea for anticipatory bail will not be influenced by the interim protection, the Supreme Court clarified. .The Kerala High Court had in August last year granted anticipatory bail to the four accused in the case..In September 2018, the Supreme Court had held that the prosecution initiated by the Kerala police against Narayanan in the mid 1990s in the ISRO espionage case was malicious and ordered a compensation of Rs 50 lakh to Narayanan.The Court then constituted a three-member panel under retired judge, Justice DK Jain, to identify those responsible for the alleged conspiracy and subsequently the Central government had requested the Court to take cognisance of the report submitted by the Jain committee.Consequently, the Supreme Court forwarded the report to the CBI as it felt that the findings of the committee deserved thorough investigation. The CBI then opened a criminal enquiry against several former law enforcement officials allegedly involved in the police frame-up.The CBI had after examining the Jain panel report, filed a First Information Report (FIR) marked as classified in the court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Thiruvananthapuram in July this year.On July 26, 2021, Justices AM Khanwilkar and Sanjiv Khanna of the Supreme Court had ordered that after registration of FIRs, the CBI must collect evidence on its own and not "merely" rely on the report of the Justice DK Jain Committee that had earlier looked into the alleged police cover-up.The four accused had later approached the Kerala High Court for relief which was allowed. .During the hearing of the appeal before the top court. Additional Solicitor General SV Raju appearing for the CBI, contended that custodial interrogation may be required in the matter but the same is not possible due to the High Court order. "Now we cannot go to the root of the matter. We cannot find evidence because of this order, it was an offence against the nation. To find out if foreign powers were involved, investigation is needed. We are required to investigate if these scientists were framed. Otherwise we would have developed cryogenic engines long back. It it settled that India was lacking this technology at the time," he said.Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal appearing for the respondents had pointed out that in the FIR, only the offence of kidnapping was non-bailable. .The top court at the ouset stated that it appeared that the High Court had not considered the individual role played by each accused, as also the nature of the allegations.The judges added that the delay in filing of the criminal complaint should not have been a factor since the same was belatedly done only after the top court had ordered so in 2021. The Court, accordingly, allowed the instant appeals and directed the High Court's Registry to notify all the anticipatory bail applications within a week. .[Read judgment]